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Class_ 7 

Book_ UiA^.2^r 

Gopight N°__ 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSTR 










THE GANG GOES TO MILL 















































THE GANG 
GOES TO MILL 


B* 

HARRIETTE WILBUR 


With Pictures by 

WILLIAM WALLACE CLARKE 



RAND MSNALLY & COMPANY 
CHICAGO NEW YORK 


Copyright, 1924, by 
Rand McNally & Company 




Made in U. S. A. 


SEP 27*24 

©CIA 807083 

''Vh / 



To 

iftp jFatljcr 

the honest miller who always wore a white hat 
turned up in the back 



\ 
















































THE CONTENTS 

PAGE 

An Early Start. 9 

How They Merrily Rolled Along ... 31 

“The Deep Blue Sea” of Doubt ... 44 

Old Dan Joins the Speed-Demon Class . 65 

Time to Eat. 87 

Jap Tests an Old Adage.110 

Billy’s Bee Tree .137 

Tiny Catches a Tartar.156 

A “Bully” Dinner. 177 

Windy Gets Wind of a Fortune .... 194 

Reddy Starts a Ranch.211 

An III Windy .233 

Tiny Takes a Tumble.253 


7 
















8 


THE CONTENTS 


PAGE 

Billy Gets Bitten .. 269 

Skipper Jap and the “Water-Witch” . . 288 

Reddy to the Rescue. 308 

They Find Some Fearsome Footprints . . 324 

Homeward Bound. 338 

Buddies All in the Big Reward .... 355 












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“Run! Run for your lives!” Jap yelled 


















THE GANG GOES TO MILL 



AN EARLY START 

il A S P E R,” announced Mrs. 
Munson at dinner one June 
day, “some one must go to 
mill right away, or I’ll have 
to buy a sack of flour. I’m almost out, 
and company coming next week! I 
thought there was a full sack in the 
storeroom, but there isn’t a one!” 

“Well, I’ll be too busy to go myself 
for a few days,” replied Mr. Munson, 
“but I’ll do up a sack of wheat, and the 
Scout, here, can go to mill with it.” 

For the first time Jap Munson, enjoy¬ 
ing bread and brown gravy, took an 
interest in the flour shortage. He hadn’t 
been in the least worried that there 
wouldn’t be any bread in the box any 
time he was hungry for it—Mother 





10 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

always managed somehow to have it on 
hand. Now he rested knife and fork on 
their handles and stared at his father. 
“What! Me go?” 

“Can’t you, son? You’ve been several 
times with me, and if you forget the 
way you’ve a tongue in your mouth. 
Take Old Dan, and the spring wagon, 
and Mother’ll fix you up a big lunch. 
You’ll have to wait for your grist, but 
take fishing tackle, and a boy or two 
for company—” 

“Can’t I take the whole Gang?” 

“If you can find room for them in 
the spring wagon,” laughed his father. 
“And, by the way, you might give the 
old wagon a good soaking in the river. 
It needs it to cure the rattles and 
squeaks.” 

Jap wasn’t long in finishing his meal. 
Then off he dashed to tell the Gang. 
As good luck would have it, every one 


AN EARLY START 


11 


of the four was able to get permission 
to go with him. Of course, there were 
certain promises that must be made to 
anxious mothers, such as keep away 
from the machinery in the mill, take 
special care not to get drowned (fortu¬ 
nately no one went so far as to insist that 
anybody keep out of the river), be good 
boys, don’t quarrel, get home safely, 
don’t get hurt, and so on and so on and 
so on. These promises made, the Gang 
could gather to talk over plans for the 
trip. 

“And we’ve got to get an early start,” 
announced Jap, whose full name Jasper 
was quite suited to the serious attention 
he gave to whatever he was doing. “It’s 
about twelve miles there, and we’ve got 
to wait for the flour.” 

“Yes, and there’ll be lots and lots of 
things to do, too,” added sorrel-topped 
Reddy Maynard. 


12 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“And places to explore,” agreed 
gangly-legged Tiny Long. 

“That’s the ide,” came Billy Ballou’s 
favorite expression, quite befitting the 
youngest member of the Gang. 

“Ought to get off by six, I should 
think,” ventured Windy Hiams, rather 
balloon-like in build, but nicknamed 
from the breezy way he said things. 

“No,” objected Tiny. “Why, that’s 
past sunup. It’ll take till noon to get 
there.” 

“Oh, Old Dan isn’t such a slow poke,” 
challenged Jap quickly. 

“No, ’course not. But counting stops, 
and mebbe asking the way, we wouldn’t 
be there much before nine.” 

“Make it three-thirty, anyway,” was 
Billy’s notion of an early start. 

"Three,” amended Windy. “By the 
time we all get together it’ll be four — 
mebbe past.” 


AN EARLY START 


13 


“If we could sleep together some¬ 
where,” began Tiny. 

“We could all wake each other up!” 
finished Jap with a flourish. 

“That’s the ide!” 

“I’ll have my watch to go by,” Tiny 
finished his own sentence, and as he did 
so he drew from his waist pocket the 
cast-off nickel watch he had inherited 
in some of the many ways by which 
boys come into possession of the belong¬ 
ings of their elders when the original 
owners declare them quite worn out. 
He looked at the watch, then at the sun, 
listened carefully, then with a deep sigh 
shook the timepiece and started wind¬ 
ing it. 

“Your watch!” 

“Some watch that is — to look at. 
But to go by—” 

“Yes, if we depend on your watch, 
we’ll never get started.” 


14 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Unless you stay awake all night to 
keep it going.” 

“I’ll bring along the alarm clock 
mother gave me the other day, to help 
spell off Tiny’s watch,” offered Reddy. 
“She goes off nearly every time right 
after she’s wound, but —” 

“We could take turns winding her,” 
laughed Billy. 

“Or waking Reddy up to wind her,” 
was Windy’s good-natured gibe. 

“Where’ll we sleep, though?” spoke 
up Jap. “If we can all bunk on my floor, 
I’ll ask Mother for quilts and things.” 

“I’ve got it!” cried Windy. “Up in 
our barn! There’s a lot of hay in the 
mow.” 

“That’s the ide!” 

“We can get all the stuff packed in 
the wagon before we go to bed.” 

“Go to hay, you mean!” shrilled Tiny, 
enjoying his own joke hugely. 


AN EARLY START 15 

“And then we’ll get off without dis¬ 
turbing folks,” finished Windy, all in 
one breath. 

“And Mother’ll fix up enough for two 
lunches, I know, ’cause she always does,” 
beamed Jap. “And we’ll eat some of it 
on the way for breakfast.” 

“Hurray!” 

Five pairs of parents agreed to this. 
So the remainder of the afternoon, as 
the boys could get together, was spent in 
making plans, until it promised to be a 
great day even if they did only half the 
things they expected to do. 

After supper the excited Gang spent 
a long time in Mr. Munson’s barnyard, 
measuring out Old Dan’s fodder for the 
day, packing up fishing tackle—precious 
homemade sapling poles and nonde¬ 
script lengths of twine — pail, bundles 
of swimming togs, frying pan, safety 
matches, salt, pepper, lunch basket, 


16 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

blankets, and so on, and then unpack¬ 
ing them because some one thought of 
a better way to fix things. Mr. Munson 
loaded the sack of wheat, but the boys 
rolled it back and forth in the wagon 
box many times, according to various 
ideas of how it would “work best.” 

“Tell you what! The two that have 
to ride behind can sit on it." 

At dusk they rallied with lanterns or 
matches or torches to collect a big can 
of “dewworms” for bait. And, in the 
manner of an excited crowd of boys 
flashing those plump angleworms they 
class as “dewworms,” there was much 
darting about with lanterns and other 
lights, many wily pounces upon the un¬ 
suspecting worms that were discovered 
browsing quietly in the grass with only 
the tail left in the burrow to make a 
prompt retreat in case of need. Gloat¬ 
ing cries of “Here’s a whopper!” were 


AN EARLY START 17 

heard whenever a captive was held up, 
a fistful of grass and wriggling worm; 
or perhaps there was a patient sigh when 
after a tussel the worm succeeded in 
slipping out of a boyish grasp and 
getting safely home. In short, there was 
so much excitement and genuine sport 
in the task that the chimes on the May- 
ville State Bank were striking eleven 
as the boys trooped down the moonlit 
village street to the Hiams barn. 

“Um-um-um-um!” they chanted, in 
mimicry of the musical gong strokes, 
enjoying them doubly because they were 
hearing them under such unusual con¬ 
ditions. Perhaps in a way they realized 
that before they heard them again a day 
chock-full of adventures would have 
been their lot; yet certainly they did 
not suspect just what an important part 
in the day’s excitement this same May- 
ville State Bank was to play. 


2 


18 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

But then they were happy enough in 
their plans, without any need of know¬ 
ing in advance all the things that were 
to happen that had not been planned. 

“My, just smell the hay!” cried 
Reddy, being the first to climb the 
straight-up-and-down ladder and emerge 
from the hole in the floor. 

The hayloft was roomy and cool and 
sweet, and the moonlight shone in 
through the big door at one end. 

“This’ll make a dandy place, all 
right,” puffed Billy as he wheezed up 
the ladder and got to his feet. 

“Best ever,” agreed Tiny, coming 
next. 

“Tag!” cried Reddy, slapping Tiny on 
the back while he was still scrambling 
off the ladder. 

But Tiny got on his feet and put off 
after him, and at once a merry game of 
tag was on. They waded and bounded 


AN EARLY START 


19 


and wallowed here and there in the knee- 
deep hay; and Tiny was unable to catch 
his wily tagger until Reddy’s foot found 
a hole in the floor and he barely escaped 
taking a header plump down into the 
manger beneath. 

The others took up the game, and 
soon the old hayloft rang with their 
shouts of “Tag!” and yells of defiance. 
Then it was turned into as gay a game 
of hide-and-seek, with the advantage all 
on the side of the hiders, as they could 
burrow into the hay and hide in dark 
corners and not be discovered easily un¬ 
less they were actually stepped on, or 
were caught sneaking toward the goal. 

But at last the boys felt ready to “go 
to hay,” as Tiny Long stated. They 
tugged and worked until they had a 
great soft pile heaped at one side of the 
path of moonlight that streamed into 
the mow. They piled it deep, that they 


20 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


might burrow in it to the chin should 
the air grow keen before morning. 

No undressing was necessary. They 
finally got Old Unreliable, the alarm 
clock, wound up so as to stay wound, 
and Tiny, by much shaking, was able 
to declare proudly that his watch was 
ticking as pretty as you please. Then 
the five lay down, all in a row, to talk 
themselves to sleep. 

At first the babble ran on at a lively 
rate, for they were planning the day all 
over ahead of time. But first one, then 
another voice grew drowsy, faint, died 
away altogether. Finally, Jap realized 
he was the only one awake. 

And he was wide awake. He rolled 
over on his back and lay blinking up at 
the moon for a while. But this didn’t 
make him one bit sleepier. He rolled 
over on one side, but was so excited at 
thought of the coming day’s pleasures 


AN EARLY START 


21 


and responsibilities that he couldn’t 
keep his eyes shut or his body quiet. He 
rolled over again, bunting Reddy with 
his knees, but Reddy was too far along 
in the Land of Nod even to grunt. So 
Jap turned back again, shut his eyes, 
opened them, then for entertainment 
began to tickle Windy’s nose with a 
wisp of hay, until Windy squeaked a 
peevish "Quee-ee-ee-eet that!” as he 
flopped over toward Billy. 

All at once a funny trick struck Jap. 
He began chuckling over it gleefully be¬ 
fore he had made any other move to 
begin it. There the four lay, curled up 
like pigs in a sty. What a good joke 
to get up on that beam just overhead 
and come jouncing down on the hay 
near them, giving them all a good shak¬ 
ing up! Make them think an earth¬ 
quake had struck Mayville! 

He crept stealthily out from the 


22 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

middle of the bunch of sleepyheads and 
stole noiselessly over to the wall. He 
climbed up on the beam, and was crawl¬ 
ing along to get directly over the boys, 
when his hand struck a peculiar little 
knot fastened to the rafter overhead, to 
which he was also clinging. Instantly 
there was a loud buzzing that grew 
louder and angrier, followed by a sharp 
stab in Jap’s arm. 

He gave a wild whoop, and with it 
tumbled headlong upon the soft heap 
of boys and hay below, yelling at the 
top of his voice. 

“Run! Run for your lives! Hornets! 
Wasps! Yellow jackets! Run! Wasps!” 

Most of his weight struck Billy, and 
so that roly-poly member of the Gang 
was the first one awake. He sat up, rub¬ 
bing his eyes dazedly, as Jap scrambled 
off him and commenced shaking the 
others. 


AN EARLY START 


23 


"Hi, what’s the ide?” Billy queried, 
sensing something gone wrong with their 
well-laid plans. 

“Hornets! Wasps! Hear them buzz! 
Run for your lives!” Jap cried shrilly, 
clutching and pawing at Tiny, who was 
as sound asleep as his own prized watch. 

The others, though, were awake, and, 
as each grasped the situation, com¬ 
menced creeping or leaping out of the 
hay toward the ladder. Jap gave a 
shout and caught at his ear, which an 
angry wasp had selected for attack. But 
he faithfully remained at his post of 
duty, shaking the sleeping Tiny and 
screeching his warning. 

He felt it was his duty to get Tiny 
out of danger, since he had caused the 
disturbance, and he received a third 
sting for his loyalty, this time on the 
shoulder. But a wasp succeeded better 
than Jap in awakening the sleep-heavy 


24 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


Tiny, bringing him up with a squeal of 
pain. 

“Who stuck that pin in me?” he 
roared. 

Then, seeing the others on the run, 
he struck out after them, shouting his 
angry threats: 

“Blame you! I’ll make you pay for 
this, whoever — wow! Say, who’s stick¬ 
ing me in the shoulder?” And he whirled 
to face this new tormentor. 

“Hornets, you silly! Hornets!” 
shouted Jap, dropping agilely down the 
ladder on top of three wriggling boys 
who had made a similar swift descent. 

“Wow!” shrieked Tiny, and, without 
further threats, down the ladder he 
came, half tumbling, half clambering. 

The boys wasted no time in getting 
out of that stormy hayloft and into the 
peaceful moonlit barnyard. 

“Say, Reddy, we didn’t need any 


AN EARLY START 


25 


alarm clock!” exploded Windy in a roar 
of laughter. But he had not been stung. 

“That’s the ide!” Billy cried merrily, 
for he, too, had escaped without injury. 

The other three were too busy with 
wasp stings to enjoy jokes. 

“Wh-ew-ew-ew!” whistled Jap, rub¬ 
bing an arm, a shoulder, and an ear 
while he capered with pain. “What’s 
good for wasp stings, anyway?” 

“Seems to me I’ve heard that soda —” 
began Windy, starting toward the house. 

“Oh, gee, no!” called Reddy. “If any 
one hears of this, they’ll guy us for 
weeks.” 

“Plantain juice! That’s the stuff!” 
And Tiny dropped to his knees to search 
for some of the leaves of this familiar 
doorside weed. 

“Chew up leaves from different trees 
— three kinds,” advised Billy, tearing 
handfuls from a near-by plum tree. 


26 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Mud! That’ll do the work,” re¬ 
membered Reddy, immediately on a 
run for the horse trough. 

He soon had a soft pat flattened 
against his smarting knee. The others 
promptly followed his example, and 
finally were plastered up and out of pain, 
or nearly so. 

“Seems to me I shan't get sleepy again 
soon,” remarked Jap, still patting his 
ear very gently. 

“Nor I!” 

“Nor I!” 

Windy, as owner of the barn, now felt 
that he owed the boys some sort of an 
apology. 

“Honest, kids, I didn’t know the was- 
sips were—” 

“No, you didn’t!” scoffed Tiny, rub¬ 
bing his shoulder very tenderly with a 
fold of his shirt. 

“What do you s’pose started them 


AN EARLY START 


27 


out this time of night, anyway?” Windy 
went on, serene in the knowledge of be¬ 
ing innocent of any blame in the matter. 

“Say, fellows, listen to Windy!” piped 
up Reddy. “He’s stalling. He’s the 
trouble-maker. It’s his barn.” 

“Sure he knew the was-sips were 
there!” 

“ ’Course he did, ’cause he didn’t get 
stung, notice!” 

“At him!” chorused the three 
wounded ones, Jap shouting as lustily 
as the other two because they were 
Windy’s wasps. 

“Honest, fellows, I didn’t know—” 

But it was no use. Tiny and Reddy 
were upon him, threatening to rub his 
nose in the soft mud where the trough 
ran over. They would have done it, too, 
but before they got Windy far Jap de¬ 
cided he’d take the blame for his own 
mischief-making. 


28 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Let Windy alone, fellows. I'm the 
one that stirred them up, though I didn’t 
know they were there.” 

When they heard how the thing had 
come about, Reddy and Tiny suggested 
that a sousing in the horse trough would 
be good for both Jap and his wasp 
stings, but Windy in turn proved him¬ 
self a good pal. 

“Quit, fellows. He’s worse stung than 
the rest of you, you see.” 

“Oh, well, then!” 

“Br-r-r-r-r-r-r!” came a muffled whir¬ 
ring from the hayloft. 

“Time to get up!” chuckled Billy. 

“Old Unreliable’s been stung, too!” 
howled Reddy. 

“Getting so light over in the east, 
must be three already,” yawned Windy. 

“My watch says—” Tiny stopped 
short, listened, then shook his watch 
with a patient sigh. 


AN EARLY START 


29 


“Moon’s still up, though,” observed 
Billy. “Stays up all night, too.” 

“Tell you what, fellows,” spoke up 
Jap. “Let’s hitch up Old Dan and be 
off. We—” 

“That’s the ide!” they agreed to a 
man. 

So they trooped quietly out of the 
Hiams yard and over to the Munson 
barn, rejoicing that the full moon riding 
high overhead made everything as light 
as day. 

“Might’s well start now as an hour or 
two later,” they said over and over on 
the way. 

Old Dan nickered when they opened 
the door.- They fed and watered him, 
all he would take, which was quite 
enough for such an early breakfast. 
They harnessed him, hitched him to the 
spring wagon, and got aboard, with Jap 
at the lines, Windy and Tiny in the seat 


30 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

beside him for assistants, and Billy and 
Reddy riding on the sack of wheat in 
the back. 

Then Old Dan was clucked into mo¬ 
tion, out of the yard, through the alley, 
down the shadowy street, and along the 
gleaming Black-and-White Trail into 
the country. And so elated were they 
over their early start that they aroused 
all the sleeping roosters along the way 
by singing at the tops of their voices: 

Merrily we roll along, 

Roll along, roll along, 

Merrily we roll along, 

O’er the deep blue sea. 


HOW THEY MERRILY 
ROLLED ALONG 

Mer-rul-lee we roll along, 

Roll along, roll along, 

Mer-rul-lee— 

So the Gang sang loud and often, 
while Old Dan carried them down the 
Black-and-White Trail, now in bright 
moonlit patches and now in shade, every 
hoof beat taking them farther away from 
Mayville and nearer the gristmill a 
dozen or so miles away. 

What an adventure it was, this start¬ 
ing off by themselves before it was cock¬ 
crow time even, before the east showed 
the slightest hint of light other than the 
generous beams shed over sky and earth 
by a round-faced, smiling moon sailing 
in midheaven! 

As for Old Dan, he was as uncon¬ 
cerned as though he considered the trip 
31 


32 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

all in the day’s duties of a pet family 
horse. To him, it was no adventure, so 
he kept his steps down to his slowest 
shamble of a walk, except when his 
driver, fearing the old fellow might stop 
altogether, gave his long-suffering back 
a little smack with the lines. Even then 
the gait he “got up” was a mere pretense 
at speed, a jolting clatter as much up 
and down as forward, which quickly 
settled into a steady walk as soon 
as his master’s attention was turned 
elsewhere. 

That was often enough to suit even 
Old Dan, for between stanzas the boys’ 
tongues outdistanced the speed of their 
advance, even making a racket equal 
to Old Dan’s hoof beats and the rattling 
wagon spokes combined. Sometimes 
they chattered of the night that was to 
them still in the present, sometimes of 
the day that for them had already 


MERRILY THEY ROLLED ALONG 33 

begun. Of course, the encounter with 
those mud wasps that Jap had acciden¬ 
tally jolted from their adobe home could 
not be quickly forgotten. 

“How are the was-sips?” some one 
would break in every now and then, 
usually Windy Hiams or Billy Ballou, 
who found it more funny than pain¬ 
ful because neither of them had been 
stung. 

“Wasps yourself!” the three injured 
ones would retort, with playful pokes 
intended to make up for what the un¬ 
stung ones had missed. 

“You’d laugh out-a the other side of 
your mouth if you had an ear that felt 
as big as your whole head,” Jap Munson 
might remind them. 

“Or a lump on your leg as big as an 
egg,” Reddy Maynard might assert. 

“Or your shoulder felt all afire,” Tiny 
Long might groan with a tender pat that 


3 


34 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

was sometimes on one shoulder and 
sometimes on the other, as he could not 
always remember which had been stung. 

“My, you fellows ought-a be on the 
way to the horse pistol!” 

“Say, Jap, if you feel so done up, 
better let me drive.” 

“That’s the ide!” 

“Humph! I’m not so bad off 1 can’t 
drive. 1 gotta get this wheat to mill,” 
Jap would reply to such kindly worded 
though self-thoughtfully meant proffers. 
“And the flour back again! And Father 
said to run the wagon into the river and 
let it soak good and plenty, to tighten 
things up. This is my busy day all 
right, all right.” 

Then back they would go to their 
“Merrily We Roll Along” once more, 
the three stung ones howling quite as 
cheerily as the two who had escaped 
those fiery darts. 


MERRILY THEY ROLLED ALONG 35 

So they went merrily along for some 
distance, Jap driving, Windy and Tiny 
in the seat with him, Billy and Reddy 
in the back in any one of many posi¬ 
tions, such as sitting on the sack of 
wheat for a seat, or standing up with a 
hand on the back of the seat for safety’s 
sake in case Old Dan might spurt up 
suddenly, or boldly pocketing both 
hands and whistling shrill additions to 
their rollicking melody, or capering up 
and down, or even making as if to jump 
out and run a foot race with Old Dan. 

“If you do, I’ll smack him hard with 
the lines,” warned Jap. 

“Smack away. It’d take a stick of 
dynamite to move him faster’n he’s go¬ 
ing right now.” 

“That’s the ide!” giggled Billy, 
though, instead of trying the race, he 
leaned over Jap’s shoulder and clucked 
loudly. 


36 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Say, if you don’t like my driving, get 
out and.walk!” 

“And beat him, too,” retorted Reddy 
with a chuckle. 

“Whillikins, yes! We’ll never get to 
mill at this rate.” 

“Why, we’ll be there now long before 
the miller’s up. It’s all hours of night 
yet,” Tiny championed steed and driver. 

“Look at the fireflies!” 

“Thick and bright as stars.” 

“Say — looky!” 

For, as Old Dan rounded a small hill¬ 
top, all eyes were focused ahead. 

“Say — what!” 

“It’s a cat!” 

“It’s a dog!” 

“Wow! Cat’s right — it’s a wood- 
pussy!” 

“Wow! Cat’s right—polecat, though!” 

“Wow! Dog nothing! It’s a skunk!” 

And right they were, for the little 


MERRILY THEY ROLLED ALONG 37 

animal trotting down the long hill just 
ahead of Old Dan was black of fur ex¬ 
cept for the white streak either side the 
backbone, also the snowy tip to the 
brush he carried high over his back and 
waved with a warning air as if to say, 
“Take care — don’t come too close!” 

“Wow! Stop! We don’t want—” 

“Should say so! My father says one 
of those fellows can shoot a far ways.” 

“Far! All of fourteen feet — mebbe 
more, Uncle Ben says.” 

“Wow! If Old Dan touches him, he’s 
a goner!” 

“Say he is! He’ll smell for weeks!” 

“That’s the ide! Stop him! Whoa!” 

But, though they all “whoaed” at the 
tops of their voices, and any one who 
could catch hold of a line tugged with 
main strength, Old Dan was started 
downhill, and, as if considering it an 
easier matter to keep on than to stop, 


38 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

he even quickened his walk to a little 
trot. 

“Whoa! Whoa!” cried the five, with 
as many mighty tugs as possible added 
to Jap’s sturdy pulls. 

However, the wagon was crowding 
Old Dan, the breech band pressed firmly 
against his legs, and the force of gravity 
was pulling him forward. Altogether 
it was easier for him to speed up than 
to whoa. So, while five pairs of eyes 
watched, wide with horror, Old Dan 
caught up with the little animal, trotting 
downhill with him, both as unconcerned 
as though they had been a dog and a 
pet family horse out for a canter. 

“Wow! We’ll hit him sure!” 

“Good night!” 

But no, Old Dan was too wise for 
that. He gingerly swung off to one side 
of the road as he passed his fellow 
traveler. 


MERRILY THEY ROLLED ALONG 39 

“Good work!” 

“What do you know about that?” 

“But the wheels — say, boys, when 
they hit!” 

“Wow!” 

It was a loud groan, made up of five 
but uttered as one, when the left front 
wheel overtook the skunk and the 
animal disappeared under the wagon. 

Next followed a loud chorus of 
shrieks, for the soft June night air that 
should smell of roses and daisies and 
lilies was set reeking with that stinging, 
sickening odor equal to all other vile 
smells put together. Then came scat¬ 
tered cries, muffled by oozing through 
noses pinched tightly between protecting 
fingers and thumbs, so that they sounded 
thin and wheezy like a tune played with 
a comb and a piece of paper. 

“My!” 

“Say — boys!” 


40 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Fierce enough!” 

“I’ll say it is!” 

“Bring on your nosegays, quick!” 

“That’s the ide!” 

Then, as the full calamity dawned 
upon their senses, mainly olfactory: 

“He got us, all right!” 

“Wow! I’ll say he did!” 

“What we going to do now? We 
can’t go back home smelling this way!” 

“Or to the mill, either!” 

“Say not! My father knows a man 
that a skunk hit, and the man had to 
bury his clothes for weeks!” 

“Uncle Ben had a dog that got hit 
this way when he was a boy, and —” 

“Say, we’ll hafto bury Old Dan, and 
the wagon, and feed him with a pole!” 

“And it made the dog awfully sick, 
and —” 

“Sick as a dog?” 

“Ha-ha-ha! I’ll say he was!” 


MERRILY THEY ROLLED ALONG 41 

“Yes, and now listen, fellows. They 
couldn’t have him around the place at 
all, till — till he’d soaked himself in the 
river days and days, and —” 

“Now we’ll hafto soak the wagon —” 

“And the dog always looked so sick 
of himself whenever they saw him out 
in the woods, and—” 

“And we’ll all hafto walk home, and 
take turns carrying the flour and things.” 

“And then they clipped the dog — 
listen, kids — they clipped him and he 
got better.” 

In the meantime, Old Dan had 
reached the bottom of the hill and had 
slowed into his usual ambling walk. 
Jolting over a culvert made Reddy 
loosen his grip on his nose somewhat. 
Before he thought, he took a breath of 
“outside” air. 

“Say fellows! ’Taint so bad. Listen! 
’Taint, honest.” 


42 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Listen to the ’taint,’’ wheezed Windy, 
laughing loudly at his own joke, though 
no one else got the point until he re¬ 
peated it. 

At first the good news was not be¬ 
lieved, either by those who kept a close 
pinch on the nose or by those who tested 
the air carefully for themselves — say, 
with half a nose at a time. But, when 
Old Dan put a greater distance between 
his party and that hillside, it was agreed 
that by a great stroke of good fortune 
the skunk had missed the Gang’s outfit 
entirely. 

“1 know how ’twas. Father read the 
other day that a skunk always shoots 
straight out behind. And there being 
nothing but ground behind that one —” 

“Sure, the way we were headed, and 
him, and everything.” 

“All he hit was the hill.” 

“Hurrah!” 


MERRILY THEY ROLLED ALONG 43 

“Three cheers and a tiger for the pole¬ 
cat— ’cause he missed!” 

“Hip! Hip! Hur-ray! Hur-ray! 
Hur-ray!” 

“But ’twas an awful narrow escape 
we had. He might-a turned before he 
shot!” Jap reminded them. 

“’Twas that!” and “He might-a — 
but didn’t!” they agreed. 

Thereupon, in gratitude to the good 
luck that so seldom deserts a boy, they 
raised their voices once more in a joyous 
round of 

Mer-rul-lee we roll along, 

Roll along, roll al-o-o-ng, 
Mer-rul-lee— 


“THE DEEP BLUE SEA” 
OF DOUBT 


Mer-rul-lee we roll along, 

O’er the deep blue sea. 

For some miles Jap Munson and his 
four buddies rolled right merrily' along 
the moonlit, firefly-lit highway that 
stretched away and away over hill and 
down again, toward the mill. How they 
hailed the signboards and road marks 
as they came up to them: 

Mayville 1 Mi. Try our ... 

Mayville 1 Mi. Save the Pieces. 

I Repair. .. 

Mayville lf 2 Mi. Trade with 
Long & Hiams. 

Mayville 2 Mi. For Sale... 

Mayville 2 % Mi. Let me fit you. . 

Mayville 3 Mi. Stop at. .. 

“Say, we’re making awful fast time,” 
they would shout as each sign appeared. 


44 


“THE DEEP BLUE SEA” OF DOUBT 45 

“All of five knots an hour!” some one 
would add, or perhaps get the number 
as low as one, or as high as twenty, as 
the speaker felt inclined to blame or 
praise Old Dan’s rate of travel. 

Then to their “Merrily” once more. 

They were finding it a real adventure, 
this being off on a journey in the last 
hours of the night or the first ones of the 
day — no one knew for certain which, 
since Tiny’s watch did not get shaking 
enough even from the jolting Old Dan 
gave it to change more than five minutes 
at a time without outside help. And 
with no grown person along! The two 
incidents that had already happened to 
give spice to the trip made the day 
promise to be an exciting one if it held 
out as well as it had begun. 

For that matter, this being out on 
the road by moonlight was an adventure 
in itself. You know how moonlight 


46 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


makes you feel — crinkly and ruffly in¬ 
side, so that no matter how much you 
want to keep going on and on, following 
the moon around the world, something 
strange in the look of things about you 
makes you want to run back home as 
fast as you can go. The moonlight 
alarms even while it charms, you know. 

Something like this: You glance out 
of your bedroom window as you are 
undressing, and admire the way the 
silvery glow brightens whatever it 
touches, and makes deep shadows where 
it cannot pierce through. You are eager 
to be out in it, until you notice how it 
gives familiar things an unreal look, so 
that you no longer see them for what 
you know them to be. 

That should be the pump out there in 
the yard, but it appears to be a queer sort 
of hobgoblin with a little peaked cap on 
his head, waving one arm as a signal to 


“THE DEEP BLUE SEA” OF DOUBT 47 

his fellow goblins to come out of the 
shadows where they are hiding and play 
with him in that wide, open space. You 
would like to watch longer and spy upon 
them; but something starts tickling in 
your hair just then, so quickly you run 
to bed and cover up well, to stop those 
little shivers that are running up and 
down your back. For some time you 
listen breathlessly to little creaks and 
rustles and whispers that may mean the 
frolic is on. You don’t get up to spy, 
though you half intend to do so “pretty 
soon.” Before you know it, you have 
gone off to sleep without ever being 
really certain that the gnomes didn’t 
have a frolic in the yard right there be¬ 
fore your very ears. 

But to be out on a country road at an 
hour you know is either “awfully early” 
or “awfully late,” according to which 
day you have in mind, the one before 


48 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


or the one after! And on a bright moon¬ 
light night, when the whole sky is 
flooded with a silvery wash that spills 
over the earth in streaky beams, filling 
the open spaces with a blue-white sheen 
and making deep caverns in the shadow 
side of whatever it touches! 

That takes courage of a sort. You 
don’t have to be a ten- or an eleven-year- 
old boy to feel that moonlight is a 
spooky thing, to feel that it is the time 
when hobgoblins, witches, ghosts, and 
such dark beings quite fittingly choose 
to be stirring. Grown-ups often feel it, 
especially after they have been out in it 
long enough to commence to be sleepy. 

Much as a boy may think he likes 
to prowl about at night, too much of 
it at a stretch has a frightening effect 
on his thoughts. Moonlight is even 
worse than darkness, for then eyes as 
well as ears are on guard; so that it is 


“THE DEEP BLUE SEA” OF DOUBT 49 

twice as easy to imagine bugaboos lurk¬ 
ing in the shadows and unreal figures 
swirling through the bright spaces. 

A road that appears shady, friendly, 
and peaceable by day looms ahead like 
a long, dark tunnel, enough to make 
grown-up drivers “jumpy” — and does. 
Fence posts become dark figures in 
white caps. Wires are nothing but 
flashes and streaks of thin, half-living 
light, as if witches dashed by upon 
them. A meadow that would be most 
inviting in the sunlight causes a chilly 
feeling to run up and down one’s back¬ 
bone at the thought of having to cross 
it. And in the hollow places are banks 
and wisps of fog, as restless as flutter¬ 
ing draperies and robes. 

“Sea is right,” spoke up Tiny Long 
at the end of one of their “Merrilies,” 
which, by the way, was not so rousing 
as it had been a mile or so back. 


4 


50 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“What do you mean — sea?” queried 
Windy Hiams. 

“Why, everywhere you look it’s like 
you were at the bottom of the ocean.” 

“That’s the ide!” murmured Billy 
Ballou promptly, as had been his habit 
for a week now. 

And it was, for as they looked ahead, 
behind, or to either side, the fields and 
farmhouses had the misty, moist, float¬ 
ing appearance of being sunk deep in 
water. Beautiful they were, but fear¬ 
some, too, especially when the road 
stretched ahead, empty of life but full 
of creepy shadows where the trees came 
close, even to touching overhead, like 
rows on rows of dark caves. 

Fog banks lay low in the hollows, 
like pools of salty brine; the moonlight 
turned them to an icy blue-white; so 
that they looked frozen to the beds of 
grass they rested upon. A creek that 


“THE DEEP BLUE SEA” OF DOUBT 51 

wound through a meadow appeared a 
crawling sea serpent; the shimmering 
trees might have been so many tangles 
of floating seaweeds. 

“It’s a regular Sea of Doubt — so 
hard to tell what’s what,” remarked 
Reddy Maynard thoughtfully. 

“Why, what do you know about the 
Sea of Doubt? What hemisphere is it 
in?” Tiny jeered in great admiration. 

“Yes, bound it!” Jap put in. “What 
country is it in?” 

“Oh, songs, books, pomes,” replied 
Reddy loftily. 

“Like the Sea of Troubles — that’s 
in Shakespeare,” Windy contributed. 

“Say, we don’t want any Shakes- 
speareses along with us! Put him out, 
quick, with his Sea of Troubles.” Tiny 
made a playful grab for Windy. 

“That’s the ide!” and Billy joined 
the scuffle which made great pretensions 


52 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


of pushing Windy out of the wagon 
seat, but hardly budged him. 

“Say, fellows, watch out what you’re 
doing,” warned Jap. “You’ll be scar¬ 
ing Old Dan out of his wits first thing 
you know.” 

This brought the boys up short, for, 
though Old Dan showed no signs of a 
desire, or even of the ability, to run 
away, they held the horse in great re¬ 
spect as the one upon whose good be¬ 
havior depended the success of the 
whole outing. So that playful out¬ 
burst was quickly stopped. 

“My, just look at the fireflies, 
though! Bright as stars.” 

“Brighter than the stars tonight ” 

“And lots thicker, too,” murmured 
Reddy, on his back in the hay that 
carpeted the wagon box. 

That was true, for this “Sea of 
Doubt” had numerous lighthouses in 


“THE DEEP BLUE SEA” OF DOUBT 53 


the weeds and bushes, where glow¬ 
worms sat and flashed their greenish 
signal fires. 

“Looks kind-a spooky, though,” 
commented Windy. 

“Not so spooky as the moonlight 
slipping and quivering over everything, 
like water,” admitted Reddy. 

“Say, you fellows believe in ghosts 
and things?” challenged Billy, thrust¬ 
ing his face between Windy’s and 
Tiny’s shoulders and so joining himself 
to the three on the seat. 

“Aw, ’course they do!” scoffed Jap. 

“That’s the ide!” 

“Don’t teither,” affirmed the two 
challenged ones; though a bit later 
Reddy added, “But just the same, out 
like this, you kind-a feel them around 
you.” 

“Even if, when you look, they aren’t 
there,” agreed Windy. 


54 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


After that Old Dan clattered on 
calmly as before, but the boys were not 
so merry as they had been. They did 
not raise their chorus so often, and be¬ 
tween times were inclined to say but 
little. And well they might be quiet, 
since they had had but little or no sleep 
the night before, or what would have 
been the night before had they not 
started off so early that “today had be¬ 
gun before yesterday had ended,” as 
Tiny worded it. 

“My, but I’m sleepy!” yawned 
Windy. “Cold, too.” 

“Here, too,” Tiny confessed. “That 
fog gets into a fellow’s eyes and skin, 
both, for all you can’t see it close around 
you.” 

“Pull the blanket up around you 
more,” Jap directed importantly, as 
was his general attitude toward the 
whole expedition. 


“THE DEEP BLUE SEA” OF DOUBT 55 


There came a loud snore from Reddy, 
on the hay in the wagon box, that set 
them giggling, whereupon the mischief- 
maker “awked” again several times. 

“But, say, we mustn’t go to sleep. 
’Twouldn’t be fair to Jap, ’cause he 
can’t sleep and drive, too,” Tiny re¬ 
minded them, after finishing a stretching 
yawn that made him wide awake, at 
least for the moment. 

“Aw, go ahead and sleep, fellows. 
Me—1 haven’t time to get sleepy. 
Anyway, holding the lines keeps me 
awake.” 

The truth of the matter was that Jap 
wouldn’t let himself give up to the 
drowsiness that came stealing over him 
whenever things were quiet any length 
of time. For on his shoulders, of 
course, along with Old Dan’s, lay the 
great responsibility of getting this sack 
of wheat to mill and the flour home in 


56 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


usable shape. It wouldn’t do for him 
to lose his hold on the lines, or let any¬ 
thing happen, such as Old Dan’s run¬ 
ning away, or tipping them over, or 
turning off the road, or some such 
accident that might easily befall the 
party if its general manager became 
careless. 

“Say, if you do get sleepy, let me 
drive,” offered Tiny. 

“All right — if 1 do. But I won’t.” 

The general drowsiness and chill and 
— well, frankly — a growing dislike for 
the moonlight deepened. The songs 
and chatter slowly died away. Billy 
and Reddy, after some playful teasing, 
curled up on the hay under the blanket 
in the bottom of the wagon box like two 
pigs in straw, their heads on the sack 
of wheat they had rolled under the 
seat, their feet among the baskets, fish¬ 
ing tackle, and other baggage they had 


“THE DEEP BLUE SEA” OF DOUBT 57 

found it desirable to bring along. Jap 
and his two helpers. Tiny and Windy, 
were humped up in the seat, a blanket 
around them as far as it would go up 
and down, all three more asleep than 
awake. 

“Why! You’re going back to May- 
ville!” cried Reddy after a short time, 
and he sprang up in amazement. “Well, 
that’s funny!” 

“What’s funny?” 

“Why, I was looking up at the stars, 
and all at once it seemed we were going 
the other way.” 

“Yes, does seem that way,” agreed 
Billy, also sitting upright with his back 
to Old Dan. “What makes it, do you 
s’pose?” 

The two boys tested the odd phe¬ 
nomenon several times; and always it 
was the same. When they were lying 
down with their heads toward Old Dan, 


58 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


after a moment or two of looking at the 
stars, there followed the strange sensa¬ 
tion of moving in the direction opposite 
to that they knew they were going. 
And, as Billy asked, “What makes it, 
do you suppose?” 

Gradually this mystery lost interest, 
and the boys grew quiet under the com¬ 
bination of night chill and lack of sleep. 

However, stronger than his desire for 
sleep was Jap’s feeling that it was his 
duty to stay awake. So when his eyes 
threatened to close, when there was a 
thunder against his eardrums as if the 
train to Slumber Land was about to 
overtake him and sweep him along with 
it, he blinked and stirred and resolutely 
made himself come awake, get out of 
the way of the roaring express to Nod- 
land. 

He wished dully that the boys would 
keep on talking. For, though their 


“THE DEEP BLUE SEA” OF DOUBT 59 

chatter made him sleepy, it was more 
comforting than this feeling of drift¬ 
ing along alone in a sea of moonlight, 
surrounded by dim, unreal objects — 
or mischief-loving Little People — or 
worse, maybe! 

Then, all at once, Jap found himself 
wide awake and staring. His heart 
thumped with terror. For there in the 
road ahead was a — a something the 
like of which he certainly had never 
seen before. 

“Whoa!” he tried to call, but his 
throat was so dry, or numb, that he 
couldn’t utter a sound. However, at 
his wild jerk on the lines, Old Dan came 
to such a prompt stop that the other 
passengers were jolted out of their 
slumbers. 

“Wha-a-at! S-a-ay! Why-y-y-y! 
Got there a’ready?” they chorused, 
quickly astir and rubbing heavy lids. 


60 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Sh-sh! Lo-o-ok the-e-re!” quavered 
Jap, pointing to the white figure in the 
road not far ahead, thin and wavering 
as if wrapped in fluttering veils, or per¬ 
haps as if its body were too frail and 
misty to more than hold together. 

Windy leaned forward, staring. 

"Why — wha-a-a-t?” he whispered, 
in a voice as thin and weak as the dim 
white figure ahead where the road 
crossed a little creek. 

“Sh-sh!” warned Jap in the faintest 
breath possible, which sounded to him, 
however, like a shout. 

“Say, what is it, anyway?” Reddy, 
scrambling to his knees, peered ahead 
between Windy and Tiny. “Oh!” he 
finished in a quavering wisp of a groan. 

“Yes, what you fellows—” Billy 
began, and ended as quickly as his eyes 
fell on what the others were staring 
at, pop-eyed. 


“THE DEEP BLUE SEA” OF DOUBT 61 

“Sh! a gho—” But Jap choked on 
the terrifying word. 

But the alarming object ahead could 
not be so quickly driven away. It still 
tottered and fluttered there before their 
eyes, dimly yet plainly, like a veil mov¬ 
ing in the wind. 

“Isn’t coming any nearer, is it?” 
Tiny wondered in a voice like a fright¬ 
ened mouse’s squeak. 

“What if it does, though?” came 
Billy’s hollow whisper. 

“Maybe it won’t.” But Windy’s 
tone was more that of fear than of 
faith. 

But it did. For, as if thinking it was 
time he was moving if he were to get 
to the mill that day, or as if impatient 
with what he considered nothing but 
boy foolery, Old Dan started off at a 
brisk walk that carried him straight 
toward the — the—whatever it was. 


62 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

Jap tugged on the lines mightily, but 
his arms must have been as weak as 
they felt, for Old Dan kept right on the 
way he was moving — speeded up a 
little, if anything. Jap’s throat was too 
dry, from having his mouth gaping 
wide so long, to get out the slightest 
ghost of a "Whoa!” had he dared try 
to call one. 

As for the remainder of the Gang, 
they were as quiet and as rigid as though 
they had suddenly been frozen solid. 

So, while the five watched, wild-eyed 
and breathless, Old Dan came nearer 
and nearer that dim, fluttering figure 
of misty white. It seemed to be waving 
him back, but right onward he clop- 
clopped. A blind horse could not have 
been more unconcerned as to the where¬ 
of and the wherefore and the what-was- 
it of that figure balancing so unsteadily 
there on the tiny bridge. 


“THE DEEP BLUE SEA” OF DOUBT 63 

“Won’t he—?” 

“Will he—?’’ 

Old Dan paid no more attention to 
those faint wonders than he did to the 
white wisp ahead. He trudged closer 
— closer—closer. Now he was close 
enough to touch it. And then, while 
the boys gasped with horror, he put his 
head right through the fearsome thing! 

And still he clop-clopped right along! 
“Oh!” 

What a sigh of relief it was, quickly 
followed by bursts of laughter, even 
while the boys themselves were coming 
face to face with this object that seemed 
to be lying there in wait for them. 

For the “fearsome” thing was nothing 
more than a wisp of hanging, float¬ 
ing, wavering fog, which in the moon¬ 
light did have much the appearance of 
a ghostly figure, if a ghost is dim and 
white and veily-looking and something 


64 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


that is half real, half unreal, and yet 
altogether thin enough to permit you to 
put your finger right through it. 

“Fog!” 

“Nothing but fog!” 

“Where’s our eyes, anyway?” 

“Say, we are a sleepy bunch, that’s 
certain.” 

“Good thing Old Dan kept his wits!” 

“Horse sense! That’s what we all 
need.” 

“Specially when we’re in the ‘deep 
blue sea’ of doubt.” 

“What anybody needs when they 
think they’re looking at a ghost.” 

“That’s the ide!” 

After a hearty laugh, they awakened 
the echoes once more with a round of 

Mer-rul-lee we roll along, 

Roll along, roll along, 

Mer-rul-lee we roll along, 

O’er the deep blue sea of doubt! 

Ha-ha ha-ha! 


OLD DAN JOINS 
THE SPEED-DEMON CLASS 


Jap Munson, busy at the lines as 
much to keep himself awake as to keep 
Old Dan headed right on this important 
journey to mill, stared straight ahead 
to spy out any traffic that might be 
coming along the highway, even though 
it was “so early in the morning it’s still 
the night before,” according to Windy 
Hiams. 

“You never can tell when some¬ 
body’ll come along in an auto full-tilt 
and want- the whole road,” declared, 
Jap with the importance due him as 
general manager of the expedition and 
owner-for-the-day of horse and wagon. 

“It pays to be careful, my father 
says.” 

“Mine, too.” 


5 


65 


66 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Uncle Ben says so, too.” 

“And Grandfather.” 

“Sure, everybody agrees on that.” 

“Sure they do! The road hogs’ll get 
you if you don’t watch out,” piped 
Windy waggishly from his end of the 
seat. 

“That’s the ide!” came a sleepy giggle 
from Billy Ballou, curled up with 
Reddy Maynard on the hay in the 
wagon box under a blanket. 

But his voice seemed to echo from 
beneath them, since the two had drawn 
the sack of wheat as close up under the 
seat as possible, to make a pillow. 

There followed a short silence, while 
the three in the seat, driver and pas¬ 
sengers alike, peered ahead, on the look¬ 
out for whatever might be coming. 

“There she is!” announced Tiny 
Long presently, as two bright lights 
appeared in the road ahead. 


OLD DAN THE SPEED DEMON 67 


“There she is!” and with the words 
Jap carefully steered Old Dan into a 
stop at the edge of the road, in spite 
of the fact that the lights seemed some 
distance away. 

“Lots of time yet,” advised Windy. 

“Mebbe, and mebbe not. Never can 
tell how fast an auto may be coming. 
It’s best to turn out in plenty of time.” 

“Funny looking lights for an auto. 
Must have green globes or shades.” 

“Awfully dim, aren’t they? But 
bright enough looking, too.” 

“Are kind-a greenish, and don’t seem 
to spread much. Mebbe the moonlight 
makes them look that way.” 

“Or they’re far away yet.” 

“They’re far away, all right, ’cause 
they don’t light up the road yet.” 

For what seemed like hours they 
waited. But the lights did not change 
in the least. 


68 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“There she ain’t!” joked Reddy, for 
the stop had aroused all the boys, and 
each was gazing ahead, Reddy and Billy 
from over the seat back, all interested 
in the coming car that got no nearer. 

“Must be it’s standing still.” 

“Is it a car, anyway?” 

“Might be switch lights.” 

“Only there’s no railroad here, is 
there? That last signboard was May- 
ville five miles, and, as I remember, 
there’s no other railroad after the one 
just going into town.” 

“Guess it’s a couple of lightning bugs 
bigger than usual.” 

“We’re seeing ghosts again, mebbe!” 

“Mebbe. Things don’t look the same 
by moonlight as they do in the day¬ 
time,” Jap explained apologetically, 
feeling to blame for the ghost alarm 
they had suffered. 

“Well, come on, you auto! Don’t 


OLD DAN THE SPEED DEMON 69 

keep us here all day!” called Tiny Long 
at last. 

And at his shout “you auto” gave up 
the trail, whirling quickly and scamper¬ 
ing down the moonlit road ahead as 
fast as its four feet could carry it, its 
stubby white tail frisking mischievously 
as it darted along. 

“A jack rabbit!” 

“Why, his eyes looked big as head¬ 
lights, didn’t they?” exclaimed Tiny, 
quite taken aback at the trick his own 
eyes had played him. 

“Did so,” agreed Jap, with the kindly 
charity he would wish his own mis- 
seeings to receive. 

“Fooled us good, all right, didn’t he?” 

“Uncle Ben says they will fool you 
till you learn the difference, their eyes 
shine so bright at night. He’s often 
mistaken a jack rabbit for an auto com¬ 
ing far off, ’cause his lights would make 


70 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


the rabbit’s eyes shine so big and far 
away.” 

“Just like the moonlight did this 
fellow’s.” 

“Ha-ha-ha!” 

“Get up!” clucked Jap. 

“Whoa! Wait a minute. I want me 
a firefly!” 

With the words Reddy was crawling 
out the back end of the wagon box. 

“Fireflies! That’s the ide!” And 
Billy tumbled after him. 

“Fireflies!” cried Tiny Long as he 
went sailing out over the front wheel. 

Windy followed close behind, but Jap 
kept his seat, and his grip on the lines, 
as a driver should do. No such revelry 
for him; his responsibilities were too 
great to permit his becoming playful 
now. 

For some time the boys prowled about 
the weeds and grass, where glowworms 


OLD DAN THE SPEED DEMON 71 

sat on stems and branches and flashed 
their lanterns to mark the sides of the 
road as lighthouses mark danger places. 

Soon Tiny came back to the wagon 
with two he had caught, one in each 
hand. The boys peered in between his 
fingers, admiring the insects. Then, as 
they were wingless lightning bugs, Tiny 
put one on the wagon box and one on 
Jap’s knee, where they remained signal¬ 
ing as brightly as ever. 

“I’ve got an idea. Let’s trim all up 
with them. Old Dan needs some lights 
to keep road hogs from running into 
him. Looky! Tail-lights!” 

And Tiny suited the action to the 
word by clapping a glowworm on each 
of Old Dan’s hips. 

“Hi! Look at Old Dan’s tail-lights!” 

“Ha-ha-ha!” Jap unbent enough to 
laugh approvingly. 

“I’ll give him some headlights.” 


72 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“I’ll put some on the back of the 
wagon.” 

“Here’s some for the sides.” 

And the game was on. 

When the party started off once more, 
they were gay as a Christmas tree, or 
an auto ablaze with lights. The boys 
even had glowworms on their caps and 
shoulders. 

“I guess folks can see us now!” they 
gloated. 

“My, don’t we look fine!” 

“Fine as Mayville on band concert 
night!” 

“Bright as New York City, right 
downtown!” 

“We won’t hafto turn out for road 
hogs now!” 

Nor did they — a fact which caused 
a happening as thrilling as any they had 
yet experienced, and was far more im¬ 
portant; for, when a loud blare shrieked 


OLD DAN THE SPEED DEMON 73 

out suddenly behind them, and a glow¬ 
ing roar warned them that an auto was 
bearing down upon them at full speed, 
Old Dan surprised everybody by break¬ 
ing into a smart run. 

“Whoa! Whoa!” cried Jap, sawing 
on the lines with all his might. 

“Ha-ha! He thinks he’s an auto him¬ 
self, all lit up like one!” 

“That’s the ide! See him go!” 

“Hurray!” 

“Whoa! Stop him! They’re going 
to run into us!” 

“Pull him off at the side!” 

“Whoa! Whoa!” 

“Honk-honk-on-on-on!” 

But Old Dan heard only the on, and 
proceeded to obey. Clattering and 
bumping, horse and wagon kept on 
along the road ahead of their rival 
booming down upon them at thunder¬ 
ing speed. 


74 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Whoa! He’s running away!” 

“Hold him! Hold him!” 

“Honk — honk-onk-onk-on-on-on!” 

“Stop him! Things are jouncing all 
over the wagon!” 

“I—can’t — stop — him! Whoa!” 

“Whoa! We’ll lose things out!” 

“He — won’t — whoa! He’s — run¬ 
ning — away!” 

“Hi! There goes the can of bait!” 

“Whoa! We’ve lost our bait!” 

“Honk-honk-honk-on-on-on!” 

“Whoa! Bait’s jounced overboard!” 

“Bait overboard!” 

“Stop him! They’re coming fast!” 

“Stop him! They’re going to run 
right into us!” 

“Sa-aa-y! We’re tipping over!” 

“Sa-aa-y! We’re tipping! Whoa!” 

It was true, for the auto was fairly 
upon them just as Old Dan reached a 
galvanized culvert pipe that was 


OLD DAN THE SPEED DEMON 75 

smoothly covered over the whole width 
of the roadbed but was thrust out at 
both ends into the roadside ditch that 
caught the water. Bumpety-bump- 
bump-bump! The off wheels clattered 
down into the ditch, up over the pipe, 
down into the ditch, one after the other, 
tipping the wagon until every instant 
the boys expected to be upset and 
scattered far and wide. 

But perhaps Old Dan’s very speed 
saved them. At least, he dragged the 
wheels out of the ditch again, and into 
the edge of the road before he came to 
a stop, where he slouched down into his 
usual standing position, as if asleep. 

As for the auto, all the boys saw of it 
after it roared past was a cloud of dust 
ahead too thick to see through. 

“Wow! That was a sprint!” 

“Didn’t know Old Dan had it in 
him!” 


76 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Old Dan the speed demon!” 

“That’s the ide! Old Dan the speed 
demon!” 

“Must be that auto was awful near 
tipping over, too!” 

“Sure it was! Why, it must-a hit the 
culvert pipe just like we did!” 

“They did! I heard it bump.” 

“Me, too! Just as they went past.” 

“I heard somebody yell, too.” 

“Too busy listening to our own 
bumps, I was!” 

“Say, didn’t we go, though?” 

“Old Dan the speed demon! Do we 
dare go with such a fast driver as 
Jap is?” 

“Oh, mebbe he only had the one race 
in him.” 

“Tchk! tchk!” clucked Jap. 

“Say — the can of bait! Wait! The 
bait!” Already Billy was scrambling 
out at the back. 


OLD DAN THE SPEED DEMON 77 

“Aw, come back! You can’t find it!” 

“It jounced off into the ditch!” 

“It’s gone for good. No use looking 
for it!” 

“But all our extra hooks are gone, 
too; they’re in the can, remember.” 

Billy kept on as he had started, run¬ 
ning back toward the culvert almost 
before the others realized he was out 
of the wagon. 

“He won’t find it!” 

“ ’Course not! It’s—” 

“Whoop-ee! Kids! Fellows! S-a-a-ay! 
Looky! Here in the road!” 

“He did find it!” 

“Must a jounced into the road, then, 
’stead of into the ditch!” 

“Looky! A bag — a big leather bag!” 
came jubilantly back to them. 

“Why!” 

“How?” 

“What do you know about that?” 


78 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


At that Reddy, Windy, and Tiny 
jumped out and hurried back to meet 
Billy as he came waddling along with 
something big and heavy clasped in his 
arms. 

“Must-a jounced out-a the au-to!” he 
was puffing. 

“1 told you they got a big bump.” 

“So did 1! 1 heard it.” 

“Say, they must-a hit that pipe with 
a bang when they went into the ditch 
on that side!” 

“Catch a-hold, every-bo-dy! ” 

“Here, lemme help, Billy. You’re 
’bout winded.” 

“There, everybody lift!” 

“Hist her, fellows!” 

“Everybody hist! Up she goes!” 

“There!” 

They got the treasure-trove aboard, 
clambered after it, then gathered about 
it. Jap knelt in the seat with the lines 













80 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


about his body, as eager for a peep at 
it as the four who were hunched over it. 

“Say, it’s a big one!” 

“A fine one, too! Cost several dollars, 
for sure!” 

“What’s in it, I wonder?” 

“I wonder! Dast we open it?” 

“Billy’s got the right, ’cause he 
found it.” 

“Sure he has. Go ahead, Billy. Open 
it!” 

“S’pose it’s got valuables in it? 
Money?” 

“Then we’ll shut it up again, and 
leave it be just as we found it.” 

“Will, anyway, whatever’s in it. But 
maybe there’ll be a ir-ward offered, and 
we’ll hafto know what’s in it, to make 
them identify it all right.” 

“My father found a pocketbook once, 
and he made the folks tell what was in 
it first.” 


OLD DAN THE SPEED DEMON 81 

“Sure we will. How’ll we know 
they’ve a right to it, if we don’t know 
what’s in it, to make ’em tell, too?” 

“Sure. Let’s have a peek inside.” 

“Tain’t so awfully heavy, by the heft 
of it, to be full of money.” 

'“More likely just clothes. Leather 
bags are more or less heavy just by 
themselves, so this one can’t be full of 
money.” 

“Well, the bag’s worth something, 
anyway. If nobody claims it, it’ll be 
nice for us to use on our travels.” 

“Sure, then we can keep it.” 

“But let’s see inside once!” 

“Well, I dast! If we just look in and 
don’t take anything out, we can’t hurt 
anything.” 

“’Course we can’t. Go ahead, Billy. 
Open it!” 

“Yes, open it, Billy.” 

Easier said than done, however. The 


82 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

boys had not had much experience in 
opening bags, as what little traveling 
they had done in their lives had been 
short trips on which they could carry on 
their backs all the clothes they needed. 
And, as it is hard to find two bags that 
open just the same way, what little 
experience they had had was of no 
great help to them now. 

“Try it this way!” 

“No, it goes this way!” 

“No, it won’t work that way. Mebbe 
it ought-a—” 

“Let me try once!” 

It took them some minutes to learn 
the secret of the clasps and thumb but¬ 
tons and hooks and clinchers and 
straps. But by working together, and 
each contributing a hint or discovery, 
they made headway. 

“There!” 

“There she is!” 


OLD DAN THE SPEED DEMON 83 

Then, with the moon to light up what¬ 
ever might be inside, all peered within. 

“What is it, anyway — shirts?” 

“Papers!” 

“Don’t you dare touch them, Windy. 
Remember, I’m boss of this bag, ’cause 
I found it.” 

“Wasn’t going to touch anything. 
Just wanted to be sure they’re papers.” 

“Well, they are all right.” 

“Must-a been a traveling man. They 
always have lots of papers along — 
Uncle Ben does.” 

“Two— I saw two men, both in the 
front seat, one driving.” 

“So did I. They must-a been going 
to Dow City to catch the Flier.” 

“S’pose so, only it doesn’t go through 
till after daylight.” 

“They must-a had the bag in the back 
of the car and it jounced out when they 
hit that culvert pipe.” 


84 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Yes, like our can of bait did.” 

“Well, we’ll never find that, that’s 
sure.” 

“But the bag is worth something.” 

“ ’Course it is, even if the papers are 
only junk.” 

“Just traveling men’s stuff.” 

“If they offer a re-ward, or don’t, 
you’re lucky, Billy.” 

“Well, let’s stick it in under the seat, 
so it won’t get lost out again.” 

The bag safely stowed away, Jap 
settled himself in driver position once 
more, with Reddy and Billy for seat- 
mates, it being their turn to sit with the 
driver, they declared. Billy naturally 
felt he should have a turn up in front, 
because of the honor due his discovery; 
he took good care to keep his feet on the 
bag, which he could just reach with his 
heels when he sat in the middle, between 
Jap and Reddy. 


OLD DAN THE SPEED DEMON 85 

“All right, let the traveling man sit 
up ahead,’’ they all agreed, and this of 
course made Billy beam. 

“Say, looky! Old Dan’s lost one of 
his tail-lights!” 

“It blew olf — blew out — when he 
was going so fast.” 

“Well, he’s got one left, and a head¬ 
light by one ear.” 

“And the wagon box’s got some, so 
it’s all lit up yet.” 

“Say, lightning bugs are good dingers, 
ain’t they, to stick all through that fast 
race?” 

“Some race!” 

“I’ll say it was!” 

“That’s the ide!” 

“Get up!” clucked Jap, and slapped 
the lines commandingly. 

“Yes, get up, you speed demon, you!” 
shrilled Windy, and danced a little clog 
in the wagon box to celebrate his 


86 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


waggishness, until, as Old Dan jerked 
himself into a start. Windy’s airy-fairy 
hold on things caused him to be upset 
into a backward somersault that almost 
took him out of the wagon, and did send 
him sprawling down toward the end 
gate. 

“Old Dan the speed demon!’’ roared 
Tiny. 

“Hurrah for Old Dan the speed 
demon!” they cheered, Jap slapping the 
lines to emphasize the words. 

And then, with another boy to add a 
line as the last one’s poetry-making 
came to a halt, they made up a verse 
that promised to be popular with the 
Gang for some time to come: 

Mer-rul-lee we roll along, 

Behind Old Dan the Speed Dee-mun! 
Mer-rul-lee we roll along. 

On the way to mill. 


TIME TO EAT 


When Jap and his four buddies had 
been allowed by their elders to have an 
all-day outing at the mill, for pleasure 
and business combined, it had been sup¬ 
posed the day would not begin before 
sunrise and would end before sunset. 

But their sleeping plans for the night 
having been generally upset, it must 
have been about as early as day ever 
begins when they set out, for when the 
boys were some miles from home it was 
still moonlight and the fireflies were 
atwinkle, and there were no signs of 
sunrise. 

Now and then a field mouse would 
whisk across the road in front of Old 
Dan, or a rustle and a gleam of green 
eyes in the fence row would betray some 
rabbit or dog alarmed into flight. At 
87 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


times owls screeched out as they flew 
over. But, as a rule, the road stretched 
ahead of them, plain as a white ribbon 
on a dark dress. It was empty of life, 
while the farm buildings they passed 
had a cheerless, deserted look. Every¬ 
where deep shadows, silvery moonlight, 
and silence, except for the noise the boys 
made themselves. Once a queer rustling 
whisper and then a snort startled them, 
but Old Dan whinnied sociably to the 
browsing horse in the field and got a 
whinny in return. 

Sometimes the boys made consider¬ 
able noise, too, as when all were trying 
to talk at once, or they were singing, or 
laughing uproariously at some droll 
thing that had happened or some funny 
remark some one had made. Again, they 
would be rather quiet, as when two 
talked together in low tones, or no one 
had anything to say. At such times, the 


TIME TO EAT 


89 


clop-clop of Old Dan’s cumbersome 
hoofs and the rattle of loose spokes were 
the only “outside” noises to be heard, 
unless a far-distant train whistled 
drowsily. 

“Say, gives you a queer feeling, being 
all alone on the road this way in the 
dead of night!” 

“Makes you feel all alone in the 
world, some way.” 

“All the other folks in Mayville fast 
asleep, and us all alone out in this road 
miles away!” 

“Six miles, that last sign said.” 

“Don’t look like any road I ever saw, 
though, this time of night.” 

Quite true, for a road that may be 
followed easily in the daytime when 
everything looks natural and one can 
pick out landmarks in the fields and 
farmyards along the way, or, if neces¬ 
sary, there is some one near by to answer 


90 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


questions, may be as unfamiliar as a 
strange road when traveled at night. 
Even a highway that is well known by 
day is a different matter by night, while 
one that is new, or at the best but little 
known, becomes a sort of Chinese 
puzzle. Then, too, with all the houses 
standing there off the roadway, so dark 
and frowning, one does feel a stranger 
indeed, even an intruder. 

Now for some time Jap had been 
worrying about the route. 

He had been to mill several times be¬ 
fore, with his father, by daylight, and 
so had thought he knew the way per¬ 
fectly. But now he was not so sure. In 
fact, he wasn’t sure at all, and wished 
it were sunup, so he could see far-away 
things better, discover landmarks, or, 
best of all, ask some one. 

Finally, he’ felt driven to ask where 
he could, even though he was not at all 


TIME TO EAT 


91 


hopeful of getting helpful or sensible 
answers. 

“Say? Any you fellows remember 
the road the last part of the way? Are 
we getting anywhere near the place to 
turn?” 

“I don’t know,” replied half his party 
— Billy Ballou in the seat beside him 
and Windy Hiams from the hay bed in 
the wagon box. 

“I do, a little,” was Reddy Maynard’s 
more promising answer, though he said 
it none too confidently. But, being also 
in the seat with Jap, he felt he should 
make an attempt at being useful, so 
proffered his best knowledge. 

“I know we go along the Black-and- 
White Trail for a way,” began Tiny. 
Long, leaving his hay couch to join the 
council of three in the front seat by 
peering between Jap’s and Billy’s 
shoulders. 


92 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“We’ve been doing that for miles now. 
But when do we turn off? That’s what 
I want to know.” 

“Look at your speedometer,” joked 
Windy. 

“That’s the ide!” giggled Billy. 

“Well, there’s a house, with a grove 
and a windmill, just before you turn, 
isn’t there?” asked Reddy. 

“Huh! There’s a house and grove and 
windmill every crossroad, and all along 
between them, both sides of the road.” 

“I know, now! There’s a road going 
through a gate and into a field on this 
side, right before you turn off!” Tiny 
waved his right hand with a wide sweep 
that nearly took Reddy’s pug nose right 
along with it. 

“Wow! Look out what you’re 
a-doing, can’t you?” howled Reddy, 
clutching his threatened feature just in 
time to save it. 


TIME TO EAT 


93 


“ ’Scuse,” murmured Tiny. 

“What’s the matter? You fellows 
lost?” Windy joined the quartette by 
thrusting his face between Billy’s and 
Reddy’s shoulders. 

“That’s the ide,” Billy assured him. 
“Great bunch of know-nothings, aren’t 
they?” 

“Huh! How much of a know-it-all 
are you?” Reddy silenced him. 

“Well, watch the road, all of you, and 
try to remember if you’ve seen things 
before,” ordered Jap. “I’m so busy 
driving I can’t do all the watching.” 

And no one jeered, for, though Old 
Dan was then plugging along at a speed 
that barely got one foot before the other, 
they had proof of the old fellow’s speed 
and determination — the leather travel¬ 
ing bag under the seat, the lost can 
of bait, their own bouncing, jouncing 
whirl over that culvert pipe. They held 


94 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

Old Dan the speed demon in consider¬ 
able respect, also Jap for the way he suc¬ 
ceeded in holding him down most times 
to a reasonable gait. That one burst of 
speed having lost them the can of dew- 
worms they had gathered with so much 
joyous anticipation of the time when 
they would be using it, they were fearful 
that another such spurt would mean 
more valuables lost, such as the big 
basket of eatables Mrs. Munson had 
provided for the day. 

Therefore all eyes were front, whether 
belonging to those who had been over 
the road or to those who had not. Pres¬ 
ently they passed a house, with a grove 
and a windmill, to the right of them. A 
little farther on they passed another one 
almost like it at the left. Considerably 
beyond that was a crossroad, and a 
“Mayville 7 Mi. Trade With Long & 
Hiams” sign. 


TIME TO EAT 


95 


“Do we turn here?” asked several, 
while Jap “whoaed” Old Dan to a will¬ 
ing stop in the middle of the crossroad. 

“Well, I know we turn,” remembered 
Reddy, slowly. “We turn and go a way, 
then turn into a kitty-cornered road, and 
after a while we come to the river, and 
cross a bridge, and we can look down 
the river and see the mill on the other 
side.” 

“Yes, I know that much. But do we 
turn here, or haven’t we gone far 
enough, or have we come too far along 
the Black-and-White?” worried Jap. 

“Isn’t the road you turn into 
marked?” 

“No, just a common country road, 
though autos can go on it.” 

“But where’s Tiny’s road going into 
a field, taking Reddy’s nose with it?” 
queried Windy. 

“Yes, follow your nose, Reddy.” 


96 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Oh, maybe it’s not on this road at 
all. I guess it’s on the way to Popejoy, 
come to think twice about it.” In this 
wise Tiny glibly relieved himself of the 
burden of producing such a road. 

“Hey, there’s a signboard, a big one!” 

“Yep, there on the other side of the 
crossroad!” 

“Sure ’nough. Some one get out and 
read it while I hold Old Dan.” 

“I will.” 

Out bounded Billy to read it, which 
he did aloud, as the moonlight picked 
out the letters for him: 

Free Camping Grounds for Tourists 

AT 

Dow City 

Everybody Welcome 
Water! Fuel! Tables! Tents! 

“Whoa, we don’t want to go to Dow 
City!” greeted this announcement in 
loud and alarmed chorus. 


TIME TO EAT 


97 


“Say not! Must be time to turn.” 

“Only we could use the water, fuel, 
tables, tents.” 

“I don’t remember that sign. Do you, 
Reddy?” 

“Nope. But it might be new since 
we were along here last.” 

“Gracious! What time is it, anyway? 
Isn’t morning ever coming?” 

“Yes, what’s happened the sun, any¬ 
way?” 

“Look at your watch, Tiny. Only 
shake it first.” 

“Twenty minutes after seven.” 

“Seven and past! Why, the sun 
ought-a be up by now!” 

“Where’d you get that twenty minutes 
after seven, anyway?” 

“By reasoning it out. You see, Old 
Dan goes a mile an hour, and this sign¬ 
board says seven miles, so it ought-a be 
seven o’clock and past.” 


7 


98 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Wish it was, so somebody’d be up 
to ask the road of.” 

“Well, it must be time to turn, any¬ 
way.” 

“You’re the driver, Jap.” 

So, not because he was certain he 
should follow the crossroad, but more 
because Dow City seemed to threaten 
them if they kept on, Jap “hawed” Old 
Dan out of the Black-and-White Trail. 
Then they all settled down into con¬ 
siderable wonder and worry as to 
whether they were on the right road or 
the wrong one. 

They hadn’t gone a quarter of a mile 
when the flash and roar of an auto com¬ 
ing along the trail broke into the still 
night. 

"Got out just in time, Jap. Old Dan 
would-a given them a race.” 

“What do you s’pose is all the 
rush over the Black-and-White tonight? 


TIME TO EAT 


99 


That’s the second car now that’s gone 
tearing along west.” 

“Mebbe they want to get a free camp¬ 
ing ground at Dow City.” 

“My, just see ’em go!” 

“Record racers, maybe. Uncle Ben 
says they’re doing it all the while nowa¬ 
days, every make of car trying to lower 
the time across country from Coast to 
Coast.” 

“Hear ’em go!” 

“Mr. Rowan was going along the 
Black-and-White one night, and all at 
once a great big car came whizzing past, 
all lit up with red and green lights, go¬ 
ing lickety-split.” 

“Say, they’re going a mile a minute!” 

“Lots of bank robbers get away by 
autos. Grandfather was reading about 
them the other night.” 

“Sure, ’cause they can go so fast, 
wherever they want, and whenever—” 


100 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Lots of folks’d rather drive by night 
than by day.” 

“Um-um, Uncle Ben does. Says the 
motor works better.” 

“That’s the mist and fog in the air, 
just like a car works better on a rainy 
day.” 

“Yes, and Uncle Ben says he has the 
road more to himself, and not so much 
dust, when he drives nights.” 

“So does my father. Once he drove 
all night, to get home, ’stead of waiting 
till the next day. Got home just peep¬ 
ing daylight.” 

“That’s nothing! Sometimes Uncle 
Ben drives all night coming home, and 
don’t get there till sunup. Sometimes 
he don’t go to bed for a long time after 
breakfast, too.” 

“Well, the fellows in that car didn’t 
have all this road to themselves, that’s 
certain.” 


TIME TO EAT 


101 


“And they made a-plenty of dust for 
us while they were going past.” 

“Oh, Old Dan the speed demon held 
his own with them, all right.” 

“I’ll say he did!” 

This subject worn out, the boys rode 
along in silence, once more becoming 
sleepy and chilled. They nodded, even 
dozed, by fits and starts, all except Jap, 
who was staring ahead in big-eyed 
worry. Finally he spoke his fears, at 
the same time drawing Old Dan up 
short with a sudden quick pull on the 
lines. 

“Say, fellows, this isn’t the right road, 
I’m pretty sure.” 

This brought the others up short, too, 
with that panic that comes to one who 
suddenly feels himself floating around 
loose in a great big strange world, as a 
new star must feel when first set whirling 
in the sky. 


102 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Ain’t lost, are you?” Reddy worded 
it in rather a quavering voice. 

“Honestly, fellows, I haven’t the least 
idea whether this is the right road or 
not. It doesn’t seem like the right one, 
but I can’t remember what the right one 
is like, either.” 

“Nor I,” Tiny echoed the frank 
explanation as frankly. “Only seems 
as though it ought-a be crooked and 
wiggly, not straight like this.” 

“It had, too,” nodded Jap. 

“Well, what we going to do now?” 
asked Billy somewhat faintly. 

“I know — let’s eat,” suggested the 
always practical Windy. 

“Hurray, let’s!” they agreed as one. 

“Time to eat!” 

“That’s the ide!” 

“Why, I’m hungry as a wolf!” 

“So’m I — and kind-a tired of riding, 
and moonlight, and — things.” 


TIME TO EAT 


103 


“Here, too!” 

“Time to eat! It’s time to eat!” they 
chanted, and spatted the time on their 
own knees or one another’s backs. 

“Old Dan, too,” remembered Jap. 

“Sure, Old Dan the speed demon must 
be good and hungry by now.” 

“Tell you what. Let’s stop beside the 
road at the farmhouse ahead, and eat, 
then sleep till daylight, and we can ask 
our way.” 

Everybody cheered Windy’s added 
suggestions for comfort, and it wasn’t 
long thereafter until the whole party, 
drawn up by the side of the road just 
off the farmer’s driveway, was feasting 
— the five boys in a circle in the wagon 
box about the great basketful of provi¬ 
sions Mrs. Munson had put up for them, 
Old Dan tied to the back wheel and 
munching a measure of oats spread out 
for him just inside the end gate. 


104 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

When each declared several times 
over that he couldn’t eat another 
mouthful or, at least, that he could chew 
it but could never swallow it, they shut 
up the basket. Then they hefted the 
traveling bag, shook it, practiced open¬ 
ing and shutting it, and even peeped 
inside once more to be sure it contained 
nothing but folded papers resembling 
packets of order blanks, or handbills 
of some sort. 

“A great find, Billy. Come in mighty 
handy on our trips,” they recongratu¬ 
lated the member whose persistence had 
made the discovery possible. 

And each gratefully proffered his 
services to help the proud finder get the 
bag stowed away with the lunch basket 
under the seat, out of the way of restless 
feet. 

Then, after some playful skirmishing, 
all five curled up on the hay in the 


TIME TO EAT 


105 


bottom of the wagon box under the two 
blankets they had wisely brought along, 
and in two winks, or three at the most, 
were fast asleep. 

“Well, well, well, look who’s here!” 
boomed a big man’s big voice, and they 
all sprang up, rubbing sleep-sealed eyes 
open. 

The sun was up, and almost as bright 
and round as the pleasant face that was 
laughing down upon them from under 
a big straw hat, as a tall young farmer 
looked at them over his folded arms, 
resting on the wagon box side. 

“Out pretty late, aren’t you?” 

“Up pretty early,” grinned Jap, as 
spokesman for the Gang. “We wanted 
to get to mill early — that’s where we’re 
bound for — but got lost, so we stopped 
to wait till we could ask some one the 
way. Can you tell us if we’re right or 
wrong?” 


106 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Well, as now headed, you’re going 
right away from the mill. That is, you 
should have gone another two miles 
along the Black-and-White, then turned 
to the right — geed instead of hawed — 
and followed the road. It winds around 
some, but keep going and pay no atten¬ 
tion to turn-offs, and you’ll get to the 
mill in time. That is, you come to the 
river and the old iron bridge, and as 
you cross the bridge, looking down the 
river you see the mill at the right.” 

“Thanks,” and “That’s right,” nodded 
Jap and the two that had been to the 
mill before. 

“There’s a little road turns off right 
at the foot of the river bridge, and that 
takes you around to the mill.” 

“Thanks ever so much, Mister.” 

“Well, it’s early yet. The wife’s just 
getting breakfast. Come on in, every¬ 
body, and have a bite.” 


TIME TO EAT 


107 


“Well, we’ve had—” began half the 
gang, while the other half, for Windy 
was on both sides, murmured a beaming 
“Thanks, Mister, if you’re sure she 
won’t mind.” 

“O-ho! she always has an extra bite 
for company. And I’m sure that no 
matter when you ate last, or what you 
had, you can stand some of her flap- 
jacks and sirup. It’s always time to eat, 
with a boy, I’ve found.” 

“Yes, sir,” they agreed, piling out of 
the wagon just as so many puppies 
might get out of a basket when the 
cover was lifted and some one an¬ 
nounced that a plate of chicken bones 
was ready. 

Jap and Windy brought up the rear 
of the procession with Old Dan for a 
drink of water and a nibble at the grass 
in the yard; but all kept close to the 
cheery-faced young farmer’s heels. 


108 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

And before they got up from that 
table groaning with good things to eat, 
the boys were fairly groaning them¬ 
selves with the quantity they had tucked 
away beneath their roomy blouses. 
Moreover, they had hired out to the 
young farmer to pick berries, beginning 
the following Monday, at two cents a 
quart, provided Jap could have the use 
of Old Dan to carry the Gang to the 
berry farm and back again. 

“Say, we’ll make scads of money,” 
they gloated when they were once more 
on their way. 

“How many quarts can you pick in 
a day?” they challenged one another, 
and decided that if they picked as well 
as they promised, they’d be well-to-do 
financiers by the end of the berry season. 

“Glad we got lost,” was another gloat¬ 
ing remark they repeated often, as they 
went back along the way they had come. 


TIME TO EAT 


109 


But perhaps most of all they beamed 
over the two breakfasts they had en¬ 
joyed that morning, for frequently some 
one would sing out: 

“Time to eat!’’ 

Which was always followed by a 
hearty “Ha-ha-ha!’’ in chorus. 


JAP TESTS AN OLD ADAGE 

For some miles the boys rolled along 
right merrily on their way to mill. 
The morning sun glittered in the eastern 
sky like a freshly minted gold dollar, 
while every grass blade and flower petal 
on either side of the road twinkled a 
diamond dewdrop at its tip. 

The morning was enough to make 
any boy feel larkish, to say nothing 
of a breakfast of piping hot flapjacks 
and maple sirup to make him feel all 
warmed and cheered on the inside. 
Even Old Dan seemed chirked up over 
the rest and the double breakfast he had 
enjoyed, so that the clop-clop of his big, 
awkward old hoofs beat quite a little 
tune as he jogged along, with the loose 
spokes of the wheels to play the “bones” 
in the duet. 


no 


JAP TESTS AN OLD ADAGE 111 


“A peach of a morning!” 

“What fun to be up early!” 

“Yes — after you’re up!” 

“That’s the ide!” 

“How alive everything is!” 

“Just listen to them go on,” — this 
having reference to the many meadow¬ 
larks that sent their liquid yodels rip¬ 
pling across the fields, or the red-winged 
blackbirds that fluted their trickling 
“Ok-a-lee!” from the tops of the cat¬ 
tails near and far. 

“My, we’re lucky that Jap asked us 
to go along!” 

“And that his father let us all go 
off like this, alone.” 

“And that his mother fixed up so 
many good things for us.” 

This of course made Jap enjoy the 
morning just doubly. 

“Just see all that’s happened today, 
and we’re not even at the mill yet!” 


112 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“A nice traveling bag when we go 
again — if the owner doesn’t claim it.” 

“And mebbe the reward if he does.” 

“And breakfast twice!” 

Treasure-trove and food—what better 
could they have asked of the good 
angels that have charge of a boy’s hap¬ 
piness? Only they put them in this 
order of importance: breakfast and 
treasure-trove. 

They hailed the Black-and-White 
Trail with hearty cheers when they came 
in sight of the highway by rounding a 
hilltop. A big touring car, filled with 
men, was speeding along toward May- 
ville, as if trying to get away from the 
curling plumes of dust that kept close 
behind, shadow-like. 

“Say, that looks like Sheriff Meining’s 
car!” 

“No, it’s not going fast enough for 
him!” 


JAP TESTS AN OLD ADAGE 113 

“Who’d he be looking for, wonder?” 

“Not us?” 

“Mebbe our folks are wondering what 
happened to us.” 

“Mebbe the men that lost the bag are 
after it.” 

“Mebbe.” 

“Well, he’s going the wrong direction 
if he wants us.” 

So they chattered idly, laughing at 
their own wit when no one else suspected 
a remark of being clever. They reached 
the Black-and-White, followed it for 
two merry miles, then all burst into 
greeting cheers as they spied the wooded 
lane of a road that branched off to the 
right. 

“Here she is — the kitty-cornered 
road.” 

“Yep, here’s where we turn.” 

“Doesn’t look very kitty-cornered 
now, though.” 


114 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Will after we get on a little ways.” 

“I remember now. It starts kitty¬ 
cornering after we get past this barn and 
house on ahead.” 

“Crooked as a snake,” declared Jap, 
partly because he meant it, partly to 
boast of Old Dan’s ability to weave in 
and out the many twisty turns. 

“Mebbe a snake made it first.” 

"And a snake in pain, too — one that 
wriggled for more reasons than just 
because it was going somewhere,” re¬ 
marked Tiny, as Old Dan went care¬ 
fully down a little hill that was “twisty 
and turny” itself, as if the maker of the 
road had dodged wild plum and crab- 
apple and oak trees all the way uphill, 
or down. 

“A snake made it first, then folks 
came along the same way, and kept 
coming, so it got to be a road,” added 
Windy. 


JAP TESTS AN OLD ADAGE 115 

"Like the streets of Boston — the old 
part. 1 read once they were first cow 
paths, then people got to using them 
for roads, and the town grew up along 
the sides of them, and now they are 
short, twisty, funny little streets. Just 
look at a map of Boston if you don’t 
believe me,” Reddy finished with a 
flourish. 

"I believe you, all right! Just look 
at this road!” Tiny joined in. 

"That’s the ide!” Billy chimed in. 

For about three miles the road wound 
along, sometimes past small farms with 
fields and orchards and meadows, some¬ 
times through shady fenced-in river- 
bottom pastures. 

"Hi, looky! There’s the bridge,” cried 
Tiny suddenly, from his watch-tower 
position in the back, where he stood with 
feet braced wide, and with one hand on 
the back of the seat for safety’s sake, in 


116 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


case Old Dan made a sudden spurt or 
stop. 

“Yep, there’s the mill. We’re there 
— almost!” chorused the four. 

It was a thrilling little experience, too, 
this getting up on the bridge, which Old 
Dan made very leisurely, almost stop¬ 
ping in his tracks, so it seemed, while 
making the rather steep approach that 
lifted the road up onto the bridge, 
enabling them to look up and down 
the placid, sunny, shady-banked river, 
from which fog was rising like lacy 
veils lifted by the wind. 

“There’s the mill, too,” they beamed, 
when from the middle of the bridge they 
could spy out the building that marked 
their journey’s end, below stream and 
on the far bank. 

The bridge spanned the river just 
above the wide, sweeping turn that made 
the mill pond; trees hid the milldam for 


JAP TESTS AN OLD ADAGE 117 

a part of its length, but, though the 
water above the bridge came so 
smoothly down, and below it flowed 
toward the mill with scarcely a ripple, 
they could hear the soft boom and swish 
of water pouring over the dam. 

“Say, it’s going to be a great day!” 

“Has been so far!” 

“Think of all the things we can do 
around here!” 

“ S’pose the miller will let us into the 
mill?” 

“Mebbe. He does whenever 1 come 
with Father.” 

“Mebbe he won’t, though, by our¬ 
selves.” 

“I’m not afraid to ask him, though.” 

“Nor I. Mr. Grannis is a fine man, 
my father says.” 

Old Dan carried them over the bridge, 
which to them seemed a very long one; 
after coming down off the bridge they 


118 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


made the right turn that brought them 
around over a smaller bridge where a 
little gully joined a reedy bayou of the 
river, up a small hill, and soon along¬ 
side the mill platform. And all the way 
they chattered and exclaimed just as 
Columbus and his men must have done 
while making their landing on the shore 
of San Salvador. 

“Good work, Jap!’’ applauded Reddy 
when Jap “whoaed” Old Dan to a stop, 
and, reaching around behind Billy, he 
gave the chauffeur of the expedition 
several good thwacks on the back to 
emphasize his approval of the way he 
had got them there. 

“Door’s shut, though. Maybe the 
miller isn’t grinding today,” worried 
Jap. 

“Well, there’s a grist on the porch 
already, so he’s got some wheat to 
grind,” Billy comforted him. 


JAP TESTS AN OLD ADAGE 119 

Looky! A man’s unhitching now, 
so it must be he’s going to wait for his 
flour, too.” And Windy pointed out a 
man already parking his team in the 
shaded place beyond the mill where a 
flowing well with drinking trough stood 
beside the road. 

“Say, this is some place!” breathed 
Windy, in great admiration of the quiet, 
shady, cosy place that offered so many 
attractions — a river, a mill, a milldam, 
a flowing well, oak groves, picnic places, 
fishing places, swimming places, every¬ 
thing handy for a round of holiday fun. 

“Will we have time to do everything, 
though?” murmured Billy, proving that 
he, too, realized the vast possibilities 
for entertainment the locality offered. 

“Hi! there he comes now,” whispered 
Tiny, nodding toward the little house 
nestled in oak trees on the bank above 
the road. 


120 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Fine morning! Birds singing and 
sun shining and flowers opening!” sang 
out the miller as he came down the 
path, a big, friendly looking man in 
dust-whitened work clothes, and a straw 
hat that had the most jolly expression 
because it perked up in the back like 
that one curly feather in a drake’s 
tail. “Up pretty early, aren’t you?” 

“Yes, sir,” they chorused. 

“You’re not the earliest birds astir, 
though,” he added, with a wave of his 
arm toward the man who was settling 
his wagon and team in the shady park¬ 
ing place beyond the well. “He got 
here before I’d had my breakfast.” 

When the miller stepped up on the 
porch, ready to start unloading their 
grist, the boys felt that their day at the 
mill had fairly begun. 

“I can’t promise you your flour before 
four o’clock,” he explained, pausing 


JAP TESTS AN OLD ADAGE 121 

with one foot on the step of the spring 
wagon. “Some grists that came in yes¬ 
terday, and one this morning, are ahead 
of you.” 

“That’s all right, sir,” nodded Jap. 
“We won’t worry about how long it 
takes.” 

“We wanted it to be a long day, you 
see,” added Tiny shyly. 

“1 do see,” laughed the miller, nod¬ 
ding toward the fishing tackle, lunch 
basket, leather bag, bundles of swim¬ 
ming togs, and so on. 

The four took turns helping the miller 
lift the sack of wheat from the wagon 
box, while Jap held the lines in case Old 
Dan might get restless or alarmed. That 
is. Windy and Tiny each caught a corner 
of the bottom end in their two fists, then 
Reddy and Billy clambered over behind 
and also took hold to help heave it down 
upon the porch platform. 


122 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

The miller unlocked the door, and, 
while the five were still peering into the 
mysterious place revealed, came back 
with a can of red paint. He put a red 
108 on the sack of wheat belonging to 
the boys, which was leaning up against 
the wall at the right of the door, then 
he started painting 107 on the several 
sacks of wheat belonging to the first 
customer. 

“This is so everybody gets his right 
sacks,” he explained. “1 give every 
customer a number on my book, so no 
matter how long or how short a time 
his grist stays here, I always know by 
the sacks just which are his.” 

This task finished, with that friendli¬ 
ness that made the miller famous for 
miles around and kept his little water¬ 
power mill doing a good bit of business 
when others in the country had been 
closed years before, Mr. Granr.is invited 


JAP TESTS AN OLD ADAGE 123 

the boys to come in and watch him 
“start up.” 

Their round-eyed stares through the 
doorway at the multitude of boxes, bins, 
spouts, and machines of all kinds had 
made them eager to witness this very 
proceeding, and consequently the invita¬ 
tion caused little joy-prickles to run up 
and down their spines. 

“There’s a hitch ring, if you want to 
tie up your horse for a few minutes,” he 
said to Jap, who was suffering a great 
inner storm between his duty to the 
horse and wagon and his desire to be 
with the boys while those interesting 
actions were going on inside. With Old 
Dan anchored to the mill porch, Jap 
felt quite free from any responsibility 
for the time being. 

First a lever here, then a wheel there, 
a low hum that quickly grew louder and 
louder as fans, belts, shafts, rods, and 


124 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

whatnots commenced whirring all over 
the building, upstairs, downstairs, in the 
garret, and in the cellar. Soon the 
orchestra was in full tune, strumming 
a merry work-tune for the day. 

Mr. Grannis let the boys follow him 
all over the mill, and you may be sure 
they obeyed his every order to “keep 
away from that shaft’’ or “don’t get too 
near this belt,” and that they heard 
everything he had to tell them about 
how the wheat was made into flour. 
From garret to wheelhouse they went, 
and long before they had made the 
rounds they were sure it must take a 
very wise and strong man to be any kind 
of miller at all. 

The wheelhouse was a particularly in¬ 
teresting place, down in the cellar where 
they could stand looking into the water 
of the “mill race,” as Mr. Grannis called 
it. Brown-green in the morning sun. 


JAP TESTS AN OLD ADAGE 125 

the “headrace” came stealing quietly in 
from the river through an opening in the 
side of the wheelhouse wall. It passed 
through a wooden grating put there to 
keep weeds and sticks from getting into 
the wheel, swirled against the fans of 
the wheel buried deep down in the 
"wheel pit,” and then, as the tailrace, 
went tumbling through another open 
space in the downstream wall of the 
wheelhouse, over the “gate,” to join the 
river again, below the milldam. 

Later, when the five had unhitched 
Old Dan, had watered him at the mossy 
trough that received the outpour from 
the spout of the flowing well, and had 
tied him to the wagon for safe-keeping 
under a spreading oak, they gathered 
under a great elm tree just below the 
mill to watch the water pour over the 
dam here and there throughout its 
length, at some places in thick streams, 


126 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

at other stretches in slenderer, thinner 
sheets. 

But chiefly they were interested in 
the tailrace, as the miller called the 
stream of water after it had turned the 
wheel and was pouring out over the gate, 
that movable part of the wheelhouse 
wall he could raise or lower with a lever 
to regulate the water power. 

“Looks like tea with thick cream 
poured in but not mixed up good yet,” 
Billy said of the green-brown stream 
of tail-water with its streaks of white 
foam. 

“And looky at the frosted cookies!” 
cried Reddy, by which he meant the 
little cakes of foam that whirled slowly 
about in the pool that lay between the 
foot of the little fall of tail-water and 
the roots of the great elm. 

But Jap was very thoughtfully puz¬ 
zling over a certain poem he had heard 


JAP TESTS AN OLD ADAGE 127 


some one recite in the last-day-of-school 
program not long before: 

The mill will never grind again 
With the water that is past. 

“I can’t see why it won’t,” he was 
thinking. "It’s the same water when it 
comes out as when it went in, except 
for the foam in it. The mill doesn’t 
change it any, or much, and ought to 
grind with it again, just as well as it did 
the first time.” 

And finally, his hazy doubts became 
frank unbelief. 

"I don’t believe it, either. I don’t 
believe that pome knows a thing about 
mills, and grinding, and tailraces. I be¬ 
lieve the mill will grind with the water 
that is past. I don’t see why it won’t.” 

So, when the other four started a 
game of “sailing boats” and had 
wandered a bit downstream, following 
the sticks and leaves they tossed into 


128 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


the water, Jap stood there, still puzzling 
over the problem. Soon a daring 
thought came into his mind. Why not 
try it? Why not see for himself? 

“Be hard work, though, getting any 
of the water dipped up,” he decided, 
rather glad of the excuse not to test out 
the adage. 

He was about to follow the boys when 
he spied something that seemed made 
and put there for his very use. It was 
a tin can nailed by the turned-back 
cover to a long pole; some one had 
evidently made it for some special pur¬ 
pose, then tucked it away under the 
propped-up end of the mill where the 
bank shelved down abruptly from under 
the floor toward the big elm. 

“If the pole’s long enough,” he 
wondered. 

Yes, it was, and, tipping the can care¬ 
fully into the sudsy downpour of the 


JAP TESTS AN-OLD ADAGE 129 

tailrace over the gate, he instantly 
had it filled to the brim. 

With a triumphant chuckle, he ran 
up the steep bank to go around the mill 
and so down the other side where the 
mill race entered the wheelhouse. 

“Hi, what you doing? Where you 
going? Hi! W-a-a-i-t!” the fellows 
called after him, but he didn’t answer. 

He scampered down the road past the 
mill, then down the steep bank above 
the mill. For an instant he stood there, 
looking into the deep, dark, slowly mov¬ 
ing headrace on its way into the wheel- 
house. Did he dare overturn that can 
of water into the stream? 

The mill will never grind again 
With the water that is past, 

said the poem, and said it in such a 
decided, even solemn, warning way that 
Jap felt rather frightened over what he 
was about to do. 


9 


130 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Huh! it can’t hurt anything, that I 
can see,” the bold, venturesome half of 
his mind assured the timid, hesitating 
half. 

And then, with a sly, mischievous 
grin over the trick he was playing on 
the poet, he slowly turned the can 
bottom side up over the mill race. 

“Now you’ll have to grind with the 
water that has passed,” he warned the 
mill. 

But, just as the water from the can 
splashed into the stream, a terrible 
thought darted into his mind, one that 
made him sick and dizzy with fear and 
dismay. 

“What if it won’t grind? What if 
there’ll be an explosion or something! 
Oh, I wish I hadn’t meddled!” 

And the miller! In the midst of all 
that heavy machinery! Oh, oh! What 
would he do now? In the haymow 


JAP TESTS AN OLD ADAGE 131 

there, by just climbing up on a rafter 
to play a trick on the boys, he had set 
loose a flock of angry wasps. Suppose 
that in his desire to play a trick on 
the poet he had started something that 
would cause trouble in the mill? There 
was so much machinery there — and 
mebbe —! 

A flood of unreasoning, blind, helpless 
fear swept over him,, just as when he was 
a smaller boy some imaginary horror 
would send him running to his father 
for protection. He was cold and stiff 
with fright. Little pin pricks were 
stabbing him all over his body. Most 
of all, he felt a sudden wild desire to 
take to his heels and run up the bank 
and away from the mill as fast as his 
whirring legs would carry him. But the 
grown-up part of him was even stronger, 
urging him to do what he could to re¬ 
pair his mischief. 


132 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


So he darted up the bank, dropping 
the pole as he ran. Around the corner 
of the mill he came full tilt, and sprang 
upon the platform, where the Gang had 
gathered near the doorway, looking for 
him. 

“Say, where you been?” “What’s the 
hurry?” “Where you going?” “What’s 
the matter?’*’ they hailed him. 

But Jap didn’t stop to explain to 
them. 

“Run! Run for your lives!” he yelled, 
and dashed through the door. 

“Run, Mr. Grannis, run!” he shrieked, 
and caught the miller by the sleeve as 
he bent over a sack of grain to empty 
it into a bin. 

“Run? What for? Some one hurt? 
Something afire?” asked the miller, 
following him to the door. 

“Hurry! Get away from the mill, 
quick, everybody!” 


JAP TESTS AN OLD ADAGE 133 

Jap scurried up the bank toward the 
miller’s house, followed by his four 
buddies and Mr. Grannis. He turned 
and faced the mill, expecting that at 
any instant the unknown but dreadful 
something he feared would begin, 
though as yet the machinery was hum¬ 
ming busily and contentedly away to it¬ 
self as though no accident threatened. 
While waiting for that event, Jap 
hastily explained what he had done, 
and why, and what he feared. 

Then the explosion did come, though 
not in the way Jap had expected. It 
was the miller, laughing heartily. But, 
when Mr. Grannis saw the shame that 
began to sweep over Jap when he sensed 
that he had just done something very 
silly and childish, the miller quickly 
straightened his face. 

“Listen, bub,” he said, placing his 
hands kindly on Jap’s shoulders. “The 


134 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


poet told the truth, in a way, for he was 
only thinking that the water goes 
through the mill race, turning the wheel 
as it goes, then joins the river and flows 
on and on, till at last it reaches the sea. 
For, of course, he was only trying in his 
poetical way to say that the water can¬ 
not flow backward, cannot turn around 
and go through the wheel again. But, 
as you see, all water is the same to a 
mill wheel, if it can only get it back 
again.” 

Then, as the boys began to giggle a 
bit over Jap’s funny mistake, he added: 
“But remember, too, boys, there is a 
real lesson in the poem. It’s this: Just 
as water cannot flow uphill, or back over 
the gate into the wheel pit, so time can¬ 
not come back, either. We ought to do 
our work well every day, our very best 
every minute, for the same day and the 
same minute never come back. Even 


JAP TESTS AN OLD ADAGE 135 

if you’d stop the clock, or even turn the 
hands back, the days, minutes, hours, 
weeks, months, and years would go on 
just the same. So, boys, what if there’s 
something you should do, like studying 
lessons or learning to do your tasks?” 

And the miller’s kind eyes questioned 
each in turn. Then he answered his 
own question for them: “Well, like the 
mill, you can’t expect to have more 
than one chance at the same water, so 
to speak, so that’s the time for you to 
say to yourselves: 

As the mill can almost never grind 
With water that is past, 

So we must daily do our best, 

For time won’t always last. 

“Hurray!” they applauded the miller’s 
little verse. 

“Oh, thank Mr. Munson here for the 
lesson,” laughed Mr. Grannis, and went 
back to the mill. 


136 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Aw, I don’t care if I was a ninny,” 
murmured Jap, feeling far more pride 
over that “Mr. Munson” than he felt 
shame over his silly fears 

“Ninny nothing! You were awfully 
smart to think of it all.” And Tiny 
gave him a good, resounding slap on 
the shoulder. “Me—I never thought 
of any poetry when I was looking at 
the water.” 

“Sure you were a smart one to think 
that out — explosion and all!” 

“Me neither!” 

“Ninny nothing!” 

“That’s the ide!” they assured him 
loyally. 

Then, complimenting the miller, they 
singsonged his bit of verse while march¬ 
ing up the road five abreast: 

As the mill can almost never grind 
With water that is past, 

So we must daily do our best, 

For time won’t always last. 


BILLY’S BEE TREE 


The Gang, jogging down the steep 
bank just above the mill, agreed that 
this was a great place, and that it should 
be a great day. 

There was the mill itself, whose busy 
whirr was a delightful work song, 
whether one heard it at close range, as 
from the doorway or even inside close 
up to the quivering machinery, or 
listened to it from across open spaces, 
as on the river bank below, when it came 
muffled and drowsy but not drowned in 
the roaring crash of falling waters. 
There was the boiling tailrace that 
tumbled over the low gate at the lower 
side of the wheel pit, foaming and froth¬ 
ing with the work of turning the flanged 
wheel it had found lying deep in its 
path. There was the gliding downpour 


137 


138 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

of the spillway that flowed over the 
long milldam, stretching from wheel- 
house to the opposite river bank. 

“Looks like sirup pouring out of a 
pan, the way it slips along over the 
dam!” shouted Windy, to be heard, 
watching the stream from above as it 
made its take-off over the crest. 

“A regular Niagara Falls,” nodded 
Tiny. 

For a bit the boys were content to 
stand there on the bank, watching the 
unhurrying but ever-moving water, a 
little branch of which, the mill race, 
went flowing into the wheelhouse to fur¬ 
nish power for the mill, while the 
broadest part of the stream poured over 
the milldam without doing any work 
at all. 

“I know why they put the mill right 
here,” discovered Reddy. “Looky! The 
river comes down under the big bridge 


BILLY’S BEE TREE 


139 


over there with the current in the 
middle; then, when it strikes the curve 
in this bank up beyond there, the current 
keeps to this side of the mill pond, and 
that makes the tailrace keep moving 
because it is part of the current.” 

“Good work,” applauded the boys,, 
patting the cloth-capped, sorrel-curly 
head that had thought out the problem. 

“Pretty deep right here, too,” ob¬ 
served Jap, pointing to the mill race 
that swept along at his feet. 

“If you’d fall in, there’d be an explo¬ 
sion all right,” tittered Tiny, which 
made the others laugh, including Jap, 
though he did it rather shamefacedly. 

“Aw, don’t keep rubbing that in, 
fellows,” he pleaded. 

“All right.” 

“That grating inside would catch you 
before you got to the mill wheel, like it 
does weeds and sticks,” giggled Reddy. 


140 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Say, when we going in swimming?” 
piped up Billy. 

“Oh, let’s wait till we get warm.” 

“Let’s.” 

“Come on, fellows. Let’s get to work 
having fun.” 

Soon they started a game of sending 
boats over the milldam, the boats being 
any piece of floating material they could 
find washed up along the bank. 

“Hurray!” they would shout, when 
a “boat” hovered on the very crest of 
the downpour, as if hesitating to take 
its unavoidable plunge. “Over goes 
Blondin!” — forgetting that Blondin 
crossed Niagara on a tight rope 
stretched over the falls, not in a boat 
or even in a barrel, though this latter 
feat has been tried several times, but 
always disastrously. 

As a part of the game was to start 
the boats as far upstream as possible, 


BILLY’S BEE TREE 


141 


the boys gradually worked up the bank 
of the mill pond, toward the little bridge 
that spanned the gully emptying into 
the river at about the center of its outer¬ 
most bend. Finally they were all 
gathered on a half-sunny, half-shady 
plot of grassy bank, with debris enough 
at their feet to keep the game going for 
as long a time as they would care to 
play it. And, of course, that was just 
the point for somebody to suggest some¬ 
thing else for entertainment, though for 
the time being every one seemed quite 
content just to sit there, tossing chips 
or not even making that much exertion. 

“Any of you fellows know a bee tree 
when you see it?” asked Billy suddenly. 

He was lying on his back, looking up 
into the big elm whose green branches 
sprayed fountainwise around its trunk. 

“I don’t,” answered half of his bud¬ 
dies— Jap and Reddy. 


142 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Do you?” parried the other half — 
Windy and Tiny. 

“Has to be a hollow tree, doesn’t it?” 

“Has to have a big wart on it, doesn’t 
it?” 

“Do the bees make the wart to put 
their honey in?” 

“Or do they use the tree because the 
wart is already there?” 

“Why, do you see one?” 

“Where is it, anyway?” 

Billy waited calmly for the flood of 
questions to pour over him, like so much 
sweet sirup of flattery trickling over his 
pride. 

“No, I don’t see one, but it would be 
fine if we could find one and get the 
honey and take it home, wouldn’t it?” 

“Say, it would that!” Windy jumped 
to his feet and commenced peering up 
at the various trees roundabout. “See 
any bee warts?” 


BILLY’S BEE TREE 


143 


“That’s the ide!” Billy assured him, 
though his own search only brought him 
to a sitting position. 

“Huh! How’d you get it without 
getting stung?” put in practical Reddy 
just then, and it was like a damper on 
the fire of enthusiasm. “Should think 
we’d met up with about all the stingers 
we want to for some time to come.” 

“Wow, yes!” howled Jap and Tiny, 
rubbing ears and legs and shoulders still 
tender from jabs the angry wasps had 
given them the night before. 

“Say, fellows, Iemme tell you about 
a funny beehive I saw last summer 
when I was at Grandfather’s,” began 
Reddy, with such vim that at once he 
had the attention of the other four, 
never so very easily won for long at a 
time. 

For once they were willing to loll back 
on the grass and listen. 


144 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Well, Grandfather drove into a yard 
one day to see a man about some pigs. 
I kept hearing bees humming around, 
but couldn’t see any hives. And what 
do you think? When I looked some 
more, where the sound came from the 
loudest, I saw bees, hundreds of them, 
around one side of the house! The man 
saw me looking at them, and said that 
a swarm of bees was hiving there.” 

“In the house?” 

“Wow! And folks lived there, too?” 

“Yes-sir-ee! They’d found a crack 
where a board had splintered off near 
the corner of the house, and they were 
using the space between the walls for a 
hive. The man said when he thought 
they had enough honey to pay for the 
trouble, he’d smoke ’em up enough to 
tame them, then he’d take the boards 
off along that side of the house and get 
the honey.” 


BILLY’S BEE TREE 


145 


“I suppose they could hive there,” 
murmured Windy, half doubting, half 
believing. 

“Why, sure they could — and did! 
Why, the bees were just thick, going 
and coming, just as though it was a 
really, truly hive.” 

“But didn’t they sting the folks?” 

“The man said the bees didn’t sting 
any of them because they never meddled 
with the bees, and, anyway, he said 
bees can smell so keen they can tell 
home folks from strangers that way!” 

“Ha — ha! Fly up and sniff folks 
to tell if they belong around the place 
or not!” 

“Must have good smellers!” 

“Why, course they have. Just see 
how they can tell flowers far off!” 

“My grandfather says that’s the rea¬ 
son bees start stinging folks — they 
don’t like their smell.” 


10 


146 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Uncle Ben says that, after one bee 
gets mad and stings a person, the bees 
around smell that stinger juice and that 
excites them all, and then before they 
know it they all start buzzing and 
stinging.” 

“Stinger juice!” 

“Sure! — It’s got poison in it, and 
the other bees can smell it a far ways, 
and will come running up to get into 
the fight.” 

“Sure they will! Why, this man that 
had bees in his house said they pitched 
on to a tramp one day and drove him 
out of the yard.” 

“Ha-ha! Course they could smell 
the tramp far enough!” 

“And the man said he guessed he’d 
keep the swarm there all the time, for 
watchdogs, to keep tramps away.” 

“I wouldn’t go near them,” declared 
Jap, gently rubbing his ear. 


BILLY’S BEE TREE 


147 


“Oh, well, I don’t mind bees. Nor 
wassips either. They don’t sting me!” 
boasted Windy. And, remembering 
that he had escaped the angry wasps in 
the haymow, the boys were inclined to 
believe that he was stingproof. 

“Huh! Your hide’s too tough; a 
stinger’d just break off in it!” scoffed 
Reddy. 

“That’s the ide!” giggled Billy. 

“Oh, they just happened to miss you 
two,” scoffed Tiny. 

“Huh! 1 guess if you’d been the 
nearest to them, they’d a got your ear 
just as they did mine,” Jap joined in. 

“Come on, let’s go up the river 
farther — see where that little gully 
goes to,” suggested Windy, for more 
reasons than one. 

The crowd started slowly along the 
narrow path in Windy’s wake, Billy at 
the very tail of the Indian file. 


148 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

But soon Billy dropped back a bit, 
giggling secretly in great glee. For it 
had come to him that he could play a 
good trick on the boys, make them think 
he’d found a bee tree, and get some of 
them to climb up after the honey. None 
of them seemed to know just what a 
bee tree looked like; for that matter, 
Billy didn’t, but the questions about a 
wart on such a tree had given him an 
idea. It would be easy to fool them. 

“That’s the ide!” he assured himself, 
and clapped his thighs with delight over 
the brilliant notion. 

But how? Oh, easy enough. He’d 
climb up a tree and put his dark gray 
cap up on the trunk, in the shadow, so 
it would look like a bulge in the bark. 
They’d take it for a bee swelling, and 
have their mouths all made up for 
honey. And what a joke when they 
found it was only his cap! He’d get it 


BILLY’S BEE TREE 


149 


up there, then come down and call the 
boys, and be looking up into the tree 
when they came hurrying up. 

“That’s the ide!” he rejoiced. 

Soon he had clambered to a place 
where he could hang his cap on a little 
snag just where two branches forked, 
so it could be seen from the ground 
between the lower limbs, but only half 
seen, in the shadows and at that height, 
and not for what it really was. 

“That’s the ide!” he gloated, when he 
had it fixed to his satisfaction. 

Then he started back toward the 
ground. But just as he was making 
ready to drop from the lowest branch 
his heart stood still. For all at once 
a roar of loud shouts and barks broke 
out close behind him. 

“Here you! What you doing there! 
Sic ’em, Tige, sic ’em! I’ll teach you to 
rob my bee tree!” 


150 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Woof-woof-woof-oof-oof-oof! ’ ’ 

Dangling by his arms just a few feet 
from the ground, Billy was in an agony 
of fear, expecting any minute that he’d 
be in bodily pain from man or dog, or 
both. He couldn’t see what was going 
on behind him. But the eyes of his 
imagination were working most keenly, 
and with them he saw an angry man 
with a club, and a fierce, open-mouthed 
dog, all ready to pounce upon him. 

What to do? He couldn’t drop right 
down into the dog’s jaws, but he was too 
far out from the trunk to climb back 
again to a safe perch in the tree. Under 
the conditions, surrender was the only 
thing he could think of. 

“Say, mister, call off your dog! 
Honestly, 1 didn’t know it was a bee 
tree! I thought—” yelled Billy, and 
kicked out with all his might to keep 
the savage barker from becoming a still 


BILLY’S BEE TREE 


151 


more savage biter. Barking dogs do 
bite at times like this, Billy felt 
certain. 

“All right,” boomed the heavy voice. 
“Only, when you light, you start run¬ 
ning and don’t stop. Down, Tige, 
down! Now drop, then run!” 

Billy did both. He hit the ground 
running, in fact, and kept right on the 
way he was headed, which was up the 
steep bank toward the road. 

Then to his horror bursts of. loud 
laughter broke out behind him — 
familiar laughter he had often heard in 
the past, and had many times joined in 
himself. ’Twas the Gang! 

The practical joker had been prac- 
tical-joked himself, good and plenty. 
Billy stopped short, and whirled in his 
tracks to face the four, all doubled over, 
holding their sides in an uproar of merri¬ 
ment. 


152 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Sic ’em, sic ’em!” roared Tiny in 
deep growling tones, through cupped 
hands. 

“Woof-woof-oof!” answered Reddy, 
between roars. 

Neither would have fooled anybody 
but a boy taken by surprise while en¬ 
gaged in a stealthy bit of mischief-mak¬ 
ing. Even though Billy’s mischief had 
been of an innocent sort, his desire for 
secrecy about it had keyed him up to 
such a pitch of excitement that his rea¬ 
son was put quite off guard. But, 
burning with shame at having been 
fooled so easily and completely, be tried 
to pass it off lightly and airily. 

“Say, what’s the ide, anyway?” 

“Ho-ho, you got it, all right!” 

“Yes-sir-ee! You got the ide, quick 
enough!” 

“Drop and start running — don’t 
stop!” bellowed Tiny. 


BILLY’S BEE TREE 


153 


“Woof-woof-oof!” taunted Reddy. 

“Reddy saw you sneaking back here, 
so we peeked through the bushes and 
watched you.” 

“And when we saw you starting down, 
we sneaked up behind you.” 

“Yes. Where’s your cap?” 

“Stung!” admitted Billy, with a 
sheepish little grin. 

“That’s the ide!” chorused the four 
with resounding knee-slaps and loud 
roars. 

“Now, bub,” boomed Tiny’s bass, 
when he could stop laughing long 
enough to get his mouth into speaking 
position, “go back up there and get your 
cap! Down, Tige! Let bub there get 
his cap — that’s a good dog!” 

“Ki-yi-yi-yip!” yodeled Reddy, in the 
most disappointed dog wail imaginable, 
and he dropped to the ground, head 
between his hands, howling mournfully. 


154 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


as a dog would certainly do when 
cheated of a good bone, or a tidbit of 
juicy boy. 

"Huh! Think you’re smart, don’t 
you?” grunted Billy, digging his toes 
into the ground and trying to think of 
some way to put a stop to their taunt¬ 
ing jibes. 

Soon an inspiration came, as it always 
does sooner or later to a boy that earn¬ 
estly desires to “save his face.” 

"Tell you what, fellows. You can’t 
any of you knock my cap out of that 
crotch with stones, three throws apiece!” 

“That’s the ide!” they laughed, 
accepting his challenge in his own favor- 
rite expression, which, he felt, he would 
never want to use again, and which, to 
tell the truth, he never did — though 
for some time he had to bite the words 
off in the middle of a good start to keep 
from saying it. 


BILLY’S BEE TREE 155 

At once the new game was on. But 
so cosily was his cap stuck on that snag, 
and so well was it protected by branches 
above, below, and on all sides, that, 
after a dozen carefully aimed stones 
had failed to dislodge it, Billy had to 
find a long pole and fish it down himself. 


TINY CATCHES A TARTAR 


“Well, let’s get to work fishing,” sug¬ 
gested Tiny, after Billy had retrieved 
his cap from his bee tree and they had 
laughed themselves out at his expense. 
“Time we got at it,” he added for em¬ 
phasis, consulting his watch, but evi¬ 
dently disappointed in what it had to 
tell him, for he shook it and listened to 
it without announcing the hour. 

“What we going to do for bait?” 
asked Jap as the five made their way 
around the mill toward their pile of be¬ 
longings parked under a tree on the 
bank near where Old Dan browsed at 
the end of a long rope. 

“Yes, what we going to do for bait?” 
wondered Reddy. 

"Dig some more,” answered Windy. 
“Ought-a be lots of bait around here.” 


156 


TINY CATCHES A TARTAR 


157 


“That’s the — er, I mean — sure!’’ 
agreed Billy, in a way that made them 
all titter once more. 

“Say, just kick over a stone and catch 
what runs out,” suggested Tiny. 

“That’s the ide!” agreed Windy, mis¬ 
chievously finishing Billy’s favorite ex¬ 
pression for him. 

“We’ll never find such nice, big, fat, 
juicy fellows as those dewworms we 
lost, though,” mourned Jap. 

“My! but weren’t they whoppers, 
though?” Tiny chimed in. “The fish’d-a 
just gobbled them down in a hurry, I’m 
sure.” 

“Say, quit it. You make them sound 
good enough to eat themselves!” 

“Yes, stop it or you’ll have me 
hungry.” 

“They sure were whoppers,” repeated 
Tiny with great enthusiasm. 

“Sure were,” agreed the four, and 


158 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

quite rightly, too; for, as the old saying 
runs, it isn’t until we lose a thing that 
we understand just how valuable it is, 
though the adage puts it in these words: 
“Blessings brighten as they take their 
flight.” 

“Hi, looky! Looky!” 

The four rushed over to where Billy 
hovered, in squatting position, gazing 
proudly down upon the place where a 
flat stone had rested. 

“Dewworms! Big fat ones! Hurray! 
Grab ’em quick! Hold on tight.” 

Of course, some of the wriggling 
angleworms, tough and quick as 
stretched rubber cord, were able to 
escape in dens made for just this pur¬ 
pose, with a taunting flirt of a tail tip 
for farewell. But, by making a quick 
clutch, and twisting the fingers around 
the length of worm as well as grasping 
it tightly, more than one boy was able 


TINY CATCHES A TARTAR 159 

to pull his unwilling and struggling cap¬ 
tive out of the ground. 

“Here’s a beauty,” exulted Tiny, hold¬ 
ing a thick, long worm between finger 
and thumb and dangling it in the air, 
as a girl would admire a string of 
cherries or currants or other dainty tid¬ 
bit, but never an angleworm, no matter 
how dewwormy it might be. 

“Broke mine in two,” muttered Jap, 
shaking the stub of worm he had man¬ 
aged to collect free from the grass and 
mold he had clutched with the retreat¬ 
ing animal. 

“Come on, fellows!” shouted Windy, 
noisy with his bright idea. “They’ll be 
thick up here around the well.” 

“Hurray! Now you’ve got it! That’s 
the — sure!” 

And the Gang followed pell-mell at 
Windy’s heels, up to where the drinking 
trough made the ground moist and 


160 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

oozy all about it. For the overflow that 
trickled down the mossy sides of the 
wooden tank kept the stones thereabouts 
glistening and the ground in summer- 
shower condition — just the ideal spot 
for dewworms. 

They were found in plenty, too, until 
Tiny’s handkerchief — “dirty, anyway” 
— was bagged full of them. 

“Making you to feesh?” asked a new¬ 
comer to mill, who, after unloading his 
grist on the mill porch, and after un¬ 
hitching his horses in the shade of an 
oak a bit farther along the bank, was 
bringing them up for a drink at the 
well. 

“Yes, sir.” 

“Me, too. Efen eef ve catch noth¬ 
ings, ve haf the fun, eh?” 

“Yes, sir.” 

“Say, wonder what’s become of the 
man that got here first this morning?” 


TINY CATCHES A TARTAR 161 

“Wonder where he went to. Haven’t 
seen him around since we unloaded, 
have you?” 

“Well, let’s get our shoes and stock¬ 
ings off and start fishing.” 

“And roll up your pant-legs, fellows.” 

Soon the five were perched in a row 
on the river bank in the shadow of the 
great elm that leaned partly over the 
water, partly over the land, even shad¬ 
ing one corner of the mill with its sweep¬ 
ing branches. Tiny and Reddy were 
squatted on the roots that straggled over 
the bank and into the water, like brown- 
gray knees laid bare by the washing 
of the current where the tailrace flowed 
down and swirled around them, wearing 
the soil away from under them at the 
edge of the bank. 

“Some day this old tree’s going to 
tumble,” observed Reddy. 

“Yes, when the roots that run up the 


11 


162 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

bank can’t hold it up any longer. But 
that won’t be today.” 

"Nor tomorrow.” 

"Nor next summer.” 

"All right, then, let’s fish.” 

For some time they kept patiently at 
it, casting and then watching corks ex¬ 
pectantly for telltale bobs. Every once 
in a while some wearied fisher would 
haul in his line to see if a lack of bait 
was the cause of the lack of bites. Now 
and then a water-soaked dewworm 
would be changed for a fresh, juicy one. 

Still no luck, so they began wander¬ 
ing downstream, trying new waters. 
Tiny, however, stuck to his seat on the 
old elm — "like a puppy to a root,” 
they jeered him. And presently he had 
his reward. 

“Hi, looky!” they heard him shouting. 

His cork was bobbing with a skip- 
and-a-jump, as some hidden creature 


TINY CATCHES A TARTAR 163 

below kept it adance with dainty nib¬ 
bles. Then all at once it went out of 
sight, and the line stretched tight from 
the tip of Tiny’s fishing rod down into 
the water. 

“He’s hooked! You’ve got him! Hold 
on tight! That’s the boy!” 

The four came running, eager to see 
just how big a fellow Tiny had caught. 
Tiny pulled in most carefully, slipping 
his hands along the rod while pushing 
the extra length up the bank behind 
him, reeling in pole as well as line in his 
extreme caution. 

“My, he must be a whopper!” ex¬ 
claimed the boys, gathered in a group 
close about Tiny, but thoughtfully leav¬ 
ing him elbow room to play his catch. 

For even when Tiny had the line in 
his hands, up near where it was fastened 
to the pole, the creature at the other 
end was like a dead weight. 


164 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“It’s—caught—all — right!” gasped 
Tiny, biting his lower lip in excite¬ 
ment, as well as in the need for using 
extreme care in landing such an 
immense fellow as must be at the other 
end. 

“Caught in the roots, isn’t he?” 

“Hi! “Be careful or you’ll break your 
line!” 

“Go slow or you’ll lose him, sure!” 

“That’s the — Say, how you going to 
get him loose?” 

“Now — he’s — a-coming — up — a 
little!” 

Very slowly the line did give under 
Tiny’s firm but easy pulling. 

“Funny! ’Tain’t ’zactly caught in 
the roots, ’cause it comes — along — 
when I pull. But — it kind-a holds — 
back — on me—too!” grunted Tiny. 

“Gracious! How much line you got, 
anyway?” exclaimed Windy, who had 


TINY CATCHES A TARTAR 165 

had the bright idea of winding the line 
about the pole as Tiny hauled it in, to 
take up the slack in case the fish should 
suddenly decide to dart off. 

“Not much — more — now! See, it’s 
right — here — near this root!” 

“But you can’t see a thing, either,” 
cried Jap, hovering over the edge of the 
bank to peer into the water, kept sudsy 
and whirling by the tailrace pouring into 
it from out of the wheel pit. 

“Ought-a see — him — soon, now — 
’cause the cork’s up!” 

And they did, too. And what a tartar 
Tiny had landed! For suddenly, not a 
foot away from them, an angry head 
came out of the water — a flat, snaky 
head with two bright eyes and a wide- 
opened mouth. 

“A turtle! A snapper!” they whooped. 

“You’ve caught him, for sure,” they 
cheered the luckless Tiny, who for a 


166 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


moment was so dazed and disappointed 
that he stared at the creature in blank 
amazement. 

But he had him well hooked, for his 
line disappeared right down the turtle’s 
throat. 

“He’s swallowed your bait and hook, 
both!” 

“Only hook 1 got, too,” mourned 
Tiny. “Hafto cut my line, I suppose.” 

“No, no, pull him in.” 

“Sure, pull him in. Mebbe we can 
get the hook out of him when he’s once 
on dry land.” 

Tiny pulled slowly but steadily, then 
shook his head sadly. 

“He’s caught some way now. Any¬ 
way, he won’t budge.” 

“Wish we could see into the water,” 
complained Jap. “Mebbe his shell’s got 
between a couple of roots, and he’s stuck 
there.” 


TINY CATCHES A TARTAR 


167 


“Mebbe he’s hanging on to the bark 
with his claws.” 

"Lemme try him once.” 

“Say, I know what to do.” Tiny 
brightened with a new idea. 

He took the fishpole and brought the 
tip close to the turtle’s jaws. Snapping- 
turtle fashion, the animal made a lunge 
at it and held it fast. 

"Now you have got him!” 

"Now just wiggle him loose!” 

“He’ll hafto come now!” 

Carefully Tiny pushed the pole this 
way and that, sliding the turtle with it 
as best he could, to free him in case his 
shell was wedged between the roots, as 
seemed likely. 

"My, but he must be a big one! He 
sticks tight to those roots, anyway.” 

But at length Tiny got just the right 
angle on the careful shove he gave the 
snapper, and had him free. 


168 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Take hold, everybody. Help pull 
him in!” shouted Windy. 

“Get hold, everybody,” they echoed, 
as so many members of a crew would 
respond with a loud and loyal “Ay, ay, 
Captain!” 

Lined up along the length of the pole, 
the boys tugged and yelled, and perhaps 
it was the noise they made that had as 
much to do with getting that unwilling 
turtle out of the water as their combined 
weight on the rod. 

“Here he comes!” 

“Looky! What a whopper!” 

“Look out for your toes, though!” 

“A regular tartar, Tiny!” 

The turtle put up a good fight for 
liberty, digging his feet into the bark 
and holding back with all his strength. 
And, as his shell was a good foot across, 
he had both the weight and the strength 
to make a stout resistance. 


TINY CATCHES A TARTAR 169 

In time, though, the boys had him on 
the sand, at fishing-pole distance, ex¬ 
claiming over him, wondering what to 
do with him. No one had had experi¬ 
ence with a turtle of this size and fierce¬ 
ness, and, though they felt called upon 
to keep up the debate about him, they 
didn’t know what to do with him now 
they had him landed. 

But they were not left to deal with 
their captive alone. Their shouts had 
attracted the attention of the farmer 
who had been fishing considerably down¬ 
stream. He now came hurrying up. 

"Mine gracious!” he began, stuttering 
with excitement and with a none too 
familiar language. "Mine gracious! 
Ain’t he a beeg vun? Ain’t he a beeg 
vun? May be you sell heem, eh?” 

“Why, I don’t know,” hesitated Tiny, 
wondering where there could be a 
market for a such a villainous-looking 


170 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

creature, but ready to become a turtle 
dealer if such a market could be found. 

“Eef you sell, I buy. Here, vait.” 
The man dug into his pocket and 
brought up a piece of money which he 
held out to them. “Who ketch heem? 

I pay heem dis — vun tollar.” 

The four stepped back, looking first 
at the dollar, then at Tiny, then at the 
turtle. A dollar for that beast! My, 
wasn’t Tiny the lucky boy, though!' 
What could he not do with a whole 
dollar? So their shining eyes cried out, 
congratulating him, though they kept 
mum as turtles themselves. 

To their astonishment, Tiny drew 
back the hand he had partly stretched 
out for the money, shaking his head. 

“I’d rather sell it to you for — ten — 
dimes.” 

How their eyes popped at that. Ten 
dimes! Why, that made a dollar, just 


TINY CATCHES A TARTAR 171 

the same. What was working in Tiny’s 
noddle, anyway, to refuse a dollar but 
ask for ten dimes?” 

“Ten times! Maybe I not got that 
many.” 

“Well, maybe the miller can help you 
out, and nickels will do, if you can’t get 
it all in dimes,” insisted Tiny. 

“All right. I go see heem. Vait. 
Holt heem fast.” And the man was 
off up the bank. 

The boys all started quizzing Tiny, 
though not one mentioned the question 
uppermost in his mind — why the ten 
dimes? 

“What do you suppose he wants that 
turtle for, anyway?” 

“How you going to get him off’n your 
fishpole?” 

“How old do you s’pose he is?” 

“How much does he weigh, 1 
wonder?” 


172 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Say, wouldn’t you hate to have him 
nab a toe, though, holding on the way 
he does to that pole?” 

The boys stood around, hands 
pocketed — all except Tiny, who had a 
tight grip on the fishing rod. They 
pondered the snapper, the oblong brown¬ 
ish shell, the long snaky tail ornamented 
with a scaly ridge down the center, the 
thick, scaly legs, the long, thick, warty 
neck, the flat head, the short, pointed 
snout, the eyes so large and far forward. 
The animal crouched there on the sand, 
at bay and undaunted even though a 
captive, his jaws clenched on that rod, 
his whole air threatening fight. 

Soon the farmer appeared around the 
corner of the mill porch and came 
stumbling down the steep bank toward 
them. 

“Veil, you got heem steel? Fine! 
Here — here your ten times!” 


TINY CATCHES A TARTAR 173 

“Thanks,” nodded Tiny, with a calm¬ 
ness that made the boys gasp. 

Then his eyes swept around the circle 
of his intimates. 

“Hold out your hand, everybody. 
Everybody gets two dimes, Mister. 
We’re buddies in this business, and all 
share the same.” 

“So?” laughed the farmer, and did as 
he was told, while the four stared with 
surprise, and grinned with delight, and 
blushed red with sheer pride and joy in 
their good friend Tiny. 

Payment made, the farmer took pos¬ 
session of his purchase by stooping over 
the turtle and grasping it by the neck 
with both hands in one quick movement. 
A deft yank loosened the turtle’s grip 
on the pole, then, a wrenching twist and 
he had wrung the animal’s head right off 
its body, as one would wring a towel! 

“You get your hook back, see?” he 


174 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


said, as he tossed the head on the ground, 
from the neck end of which dangled 
Tiny’s hook. “Baited, too, eet ees.” 

He then held up the body by the tail, 
hefting it in great admiration, almost 
smacking his lips over it. 

“Ten, twelf, feefteen pound, maybe,” 
he gloated, as he started off with it. 

“Say!” called Tiny, voicing the gen¬ 
eral curiosity. “What you going to do 
with him, Mister?” 

“ 'A-a-ah! I take heem to mine vife, 
home, and ve half soup of heem — fine 
soup!” Then the man did smack his 
lips, as if he already tasted the brew. 
“You see, ve — how you say? — shuck 
heem out from hees shell, ve skeen heem 
goot, boil heem long time, so he make 
soup — ah, such fine, very, very fine 
soup!” 

“Soup! Wow!” murmured the five as 
they turned back to the problem still 


TINY CATCHES A TARTAR 


175 


left them — landing a real fish for their 
dinner. 

“Wow! I wouldn’t eat that thing for 
a dollar — not for two dollars!” ex¬ 
claimed Jap, holding both hands over 
his shrinking stomach. 

“Oh, some folks eat turtles.” 

“Yes, Grandfather used to live by the 
ocean, in New Jersey, and he says green- 
turtle soup is awfully good. But you 
wouldn’t catch him eating any river 
turtles, he says.” 

“I don’t guess many folks eat snap¬ 
pers, do they?” 

“Never heard of it before — just sea 
turtles, in stories. Didn’t Robinson 
Crusoe eat ’em, or their eggs, or some¬ 
body else eat ’em? I read somewhere 
about it.” 

“Guess so. Mebbe it was Swiss 
Family Robinson. They found so much 
truck to eat on their island, you know.” 


176 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“I remember they did eat turtle’s 
eggs; but it’d be sea turtle eggs.” 

‘‘Well, mebbe snapper soup might 
taste all right then,” reflected Windy, 
“but I’d rather be excused.” 

“Me, too,’ they agreed to a man, 
jingling their dimes musically in cupped 
hands. 


A "BULLY” DINNER 


The five had returned to their fishing, 
each one anxious to be the first to land 
a catch — pickerel, perch, carp, anything 
so it be a wriggling, finny prize at the 
end of a hook, to gloat over with pride. 
For of course Tiny’s tartar of a snap¬ 
ping turtle could not rightly be counted 
a finny prize, since it was not a fish and 
had been promptly disposed of. 

"A nice fish for our dinner,” they had 
planned the night before, when they had 
carefully included an old camp frying 
pan, matches, salt, pepper, and so on, 
among the numerous pieces of dunnage 
the day’s festivities demanded. And they 
continued to relish the fish in advance 
now, as they wandered up and down the 
stream, impatiently casting to right and 
left, before and behind, or as they 


12 


177 


178 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

perched on rocks or tree roots or river 
bank and held fishpoles over likely 
looking pools. 

"Sh—sh! everyone!” Reddy warned 
the others from time to time, from a wet, 
slippery, tip-sided stone he had fancied 
might be quite surrounded with fish of 
all sorts. “Keep still, can’t you? Fish 
never bite if you whoop and yell around 
all the time. They scare awfully easy.” 

“Huh! Nothing bites my hook even 
when I do keep still,” Jap replied, and 
he gave the water a sharp slap with his 
line and ventured an inch farther into 
the stream, now perilously near the 
rolled-up edge of his trousers. 

“They don’t bite in the sun, that’s cer¬ 
tain !” And Windy changed from a pool 
where the sand grains at the bottom 
gleamed in the sunshine to the dark hole 
at the foot of the elm just about where 
Tiny’s turtle had been lurking. 


A “BULLY” DINNER 


179 


“They don’t bite in the shade, that’s 
certain!” Tiny jeered, and he moved 
out from under the elm tree to try his 
luck in the sunny spot Windy had just 
vacated. 

“They don’t bite at all — anyway, not 
this late in the day, when the sun is up 
and they can see your shadow,” agreed 
Billy, casting rather dispiritedly from 
where he stood in a shallow place about 
midstream several rods below the roar¬ 
ing milldam. 

“Early morning is the best time to 
fish. We should-a been fishing just 
about the time we were leaving the 
farmer’s.” 

“And miss the flapjacks and sirup!” 

“No. Only Billy’s right; if the fish 
don’t see your shadow they bite better.” 

“Sh — sh! I tell you, you’ll scare 
’em all away, keeping up such a jabber¬ 
ing,” growled Reddy. 


180 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

In disgust he started wading down¬ 
stream, away from the noisy group that 
just would talk, whether the fish liked 
it or not. The current caught his cork 
and started off with it; he followed its 
floating course, as in a sort of idle game, 
letting it lead him. 

He had gone quite some distance 
when all at once it stopped moving. 
Some weight on the hook pulled it partly 
under the surface, so that the water 
rippled around and over it in curling 
little eddies, just as about a stone that 
peeps above the riffles. 

“Hi, fellows, looky! I’ve caught one! 
Looky!” He yelled his triumph the in¬ 
stant he realized that something was 
troubling his cork. 

“Hold him! Hold him!” yelled the 
four. 

And, mistaking Reddy’s announce¬ 
ment of triumph as a call for help, they 


A “BULLY” DINNER 


181 


tossed their own poles on the sand and 
came plunging down the river toward 
him. 

“Say! Quit it! Don’t you be a-scar- 
ing my pick’rel off before — there, what 
did I tell you!” 

For, excited with the fear of losing his 
catch, or with concern that the boys 
would interfere with his drawing up his 
own shining prize, Reddy gave the line 
a quick jerk. Immediately it came 
away. But when the dangling end of 
his line appeared in the air it was quite 
empty. Even his hook was gone! There 
was nothing below the cork but a yard 
or so of wet, dripping line. 

“Gone!” he wailed. 

“Hook, bait, and sinker gone!” 
groaned Windy. 

“Tough luck, Reddy. Not even a 
turtle!” 

“It must-a been a regular whale!” 


182 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“That’s the—and not another hook 
among us, either!” 

“I guess it was caught on a stone, or 
snag, or something down in the bottom 
of the river,” grieved Reddy. 

“Oh, well, not much chance of catch¬ 
ing anything, anyway!” 

They consoled Reddy a bit longer, 
there being nothing else they could do 
for him. The spare hooks they brought 
from home had been packed into the 
can of bait for safe-keeping, and that 
had been lost long hours ago. So, after 
a time, the four returned to their own 
poles, each continuing his fishing exer¬ 
tions in whatsoever place seemed the 
most likely spot. 

Reddy felt very downcast. He had set 
his heart on catching a fish, and now 
nothing else seemed interesting. If only 
he had been more careful! No use at 
all to jerk the line as he did. All for 


A “BULLY” DINNER 183 

lack of a little forethought, in his excite¬ 
ment he had spoiled his whole day. 

So he gloomed, as he waded slowly 
back upstream toward the boys. Then, 
through the clear water, he discovered 
the slightly winding little furrow in the 
sandy river bed made by a clam on a 
jaunt. He followed it, and a yard or 
so farther on came up with the traveler, 
a big fellow with white foot protruding 
from the two halves of his shell. With 
some of his old-time zest, Reddy lifted 
it dripping from the water and studied 
it, admiring the deft ease with which it 
slid into its house and closed the door 
firmly after it, as if to announce, “No 
Admittance.” 

“What a great piece of bait, if I only 
had a hook,” he thought. 

Then a grin spread over his face, so 
glum such a short time before. Why 
bother with a hook? If a fish would 


184 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

swallow a hook, why not a piece of bait 
without a hook? Worth trying, any¬ 
way. 

So, with his knife, he pried the clam 
from its shell. He tied his fishline 
tightly about the creature’s middle, so 
that it looked like a little bundle of 
white meat. With this tempting bit 
dangling below the cork, he kept on 
down the river. 

Soon he came to a place where he 
could wade across to the opposite bank 
without getting wet much above his hips. 

“Just so 1 don’t get my clean waist 
wet, it’s all right. My pants, they’ll 
dry before night,” he assured himself, 
and went on though the surge of the 
current, and the lift of the water, kept 
him reared breathlessly up on tiptoe. 

Once on the opposite bank, he found 
a seat under a tree. He settled himself 
there, then let his line sag out of sight in 


A “BULLY” DINNER 185 

a deep, shady pool where the bank had 
been sheared away around the foot of 
the tree. He didn’t call to the boys, 
for it would mean they’d all chase pell- 
mell after him, and go scaring all the 
fish away faster than he could coax them 
into the pool with his clam. 

For some little time he half sat, half 
lay there under the tree, taking care to 
keep back so that he wouldn’t be seen 
from the pool. As he faced the sun, 
there was no danger of his casting a 
frightening shadow over the water. Of 
course, he had to guess what was going 
on about his line by the feeling, and 
such a long time passed without any 
other pull than the gentle tug of the 
current that the drone of the mill and 
the sh-sh-sh of falling waters, the warm 
sunshine, and his utter ease, all com¬ 
bined to lull him off to sleep. 

Just as he was nodding, there was a 


186 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

sudden pull on his line that brought him 
wide awake. Then a weight and a sort 
of telegraphic twitching all through line, 
pole, and even the length of his arms 
that said as plainly as words: “You’ve 
caught your fish all right, unless 1 can 
get away before you can land me.” 

But Reddy had learned one lesson: 
“Never brag of your fish until you’ve 
got him.” So this time, instead of 
shouting a wild announcement to the 
boys, he shut his lips grimly, and put 
all his wits into the task of landing 
whatever had swallowed his bait. 

“My, it must be a whopper!” he did 
permit himself to whisper as he clenched 
his teeth and pulled as gently as possible 
on the line. 

Peering over the bank, he could see 
that his cork was quite out of sight, 
while that wordless message kept com¬ 
ing up line and pole from the struggling 


A “BULLY” DINNER 


187 


captive below: “You’ve got me, all 
right!” 

“Hi, looky! See where Reddy’s got!” 

“Yes, and what’s he doing?” 

“Yes, what is he doing, trying to fish 
without a hook?” 

“But he’s got the best place of all. 
Where he is, he doesn’t make a shadow 
on the water at all!” 

“Why didn’t us geeses think of it 
before? Let’s all go over on that side?’ - ’ 

“Come on, let’s!” 

And on they came, as fast as they 
could wade across, squealing as the 
water got deeper, stopping to roll up 
their trouser legs, or stooping to pull 
them up without stopping. But Windy 
in the lead hadn’t reached the bank 
when, to their surprise and Reddy’s great 
delight, his hand-over-hand reeling in 
of pole and line brought the fish out 
of water. To be sure, it was not a 


188 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

finny prize, nor did it gleam diamond¬ 
like in the sunshine, but it was neverthe¬ 
less a fish. 

It was a bullhead, a member of that 
heavy, stupid, sluggish, ugly, scaleless, 
barbed catfish tribe that haunts muddy 
pools and sluggish places, that will 
swallow almost anything and never 
fight much for escape, rather seeming 
to plead for a place on the table. But it 
was a fish, and an edible one, and the 
first one caught by the Gang, so Reddy 
was all agrin as he dangled it before 
four pairs of admiring, astounded eyes. 

"Caught it without a hook, too!” he 
triumphed. “Just tied a clam on the end 
of my line, and the fish did the rest!” 

“Well, you are some fisherman!” 

“I’ll say you are, to catch a fish with¬ 
out a hook!” 

“How did it stay on, though, without 
a hook?” 


A “BULLY” DINNER 


189 


“Oh, its mouth is little, and the bait 
big, and once it got its teeth in the tough 
clam, it was good and caught.” 

“Look out for its pickers; they hurt 
like needles if they stick you.” 

“Say, let’s all go to fishing without 
hooks!” 

“No, let’s eat!” 

“That’s the — er, time to eat, I say!” 

“I say it, too — time to eat!” 

“ ’Course, it’s only a bullhead,” 
Reddy began apologetically. 

“What of it? Folks eat bullheads.” 

“Sure they do — when they can’t get 
any better fish.” 

“It’ll make a bully dinner!” 

“Bully is right!” 

What a busy crowd they became! 
Back across the stream to where they 
had left Old Dan and the plunder! Some 
gathered firewood. Some built a little 
fireplace out of stones on the sand. 


190 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

Some fed and watered Old Dan. Some 
brought out the lunch baskets. Some 
cleaned the bullhead. Some ran to the 
mill for a handful of flour to roll the 
pieces in. Some scraped the butter off 
sandwiches for frying the fish. 

Of course, all must take a hand at 
holding the pan over the flame, at suck¬ 
ing burned fingers, at trying the fish, 
turning it, salting and peppering it, 
rolling more pieces in flour, building up 
more fire, frying more pieces. What fun 
it all was, those many little duties con¬ 
nected with getting that bullhead fried 
to a crisp, flaky doneness! 

How eager they all were for a bite! 

“My, isn’t it done yet?” 

“Say, you can’t hurry fish, Mother 
says.” 

“ ’Course not. Hold your horses a 
while, till this fish gets good and done, 
can’t you?” 


A “BULLY” DINNER 


191 


“Nobody wants to eat raw fish, that’s 
certain.” 

“No, but can’t you cook it faster, get 
more fire up and make it sizzle louder?” 

“It’s sizzling loud enough. If you 
try to hurry fish, it burns on the outside 
before it’s done inside.” 

“My, I’m about starved!” 

“Me, too. Empty as a barrel with no 
bottom to it.” 

“Hungry nothing! Why, you had 
two breakfasts!” 

“Say, I know a funny story about 
fish.” 

“Tell it, tell it! Mebbe it’ll keep 
us from starving till that bullhead is 
done.” 

“Grandfather says when he was a 
little shaver they lived in a clearing 
in the woods, near a brook. His father 
used to go catch fish for breakfast, and 
they’d all be so hungry, their mother’d 


192 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

make ’em — the kids, I mean — each 
stand in a corner of the log cabin, with 
a plate and some bread, and wait while 
she cooked the fish in the fireplace. 

“When a little brook trout was done, 
she’d hold it out on a long-handled fork 
toward one of them, and that meant it 
was their fish. They’d come get it, and 
go back to their corner and eat it. The 
next fish would go to the kid in the next 
corner, and so on, till it got back to 
the first one again. That way, they 
couldn’t quarrel about whose turn it 
was, ’cause their mother always remem¬ 
bered which one got the last fish, and 
they wouldn’t change corners with each 
other, of course.” 

“Sa-ay! That story makes me all the 
hungrier for fish.” 

“Me, too. Isn’t it done yet?” 

“No, got to have more wood. Hustle, 
fellows!” 


A “BULLY” DINNER 


193 


“I’m most too weak and hungry to 
hustle; let me tend the fish while you go 
get wood.” 

“Aw, you don’t know how to fry fish.” 

“Sure, let him alone, he’s doing a good 
enough job.” 

Finally it was cooked and ready to 
serve on the tin pans the boys had 
brought for that purpose; forks weren’t 
necessary. And when the last piece had 
been eaten, and Reddy had told for the 
dozenth time or more just how he had 
succeeded in catching such a prize with¬ 
out “a sign of a hook — or ladder, 
either,” one after another the boys lay 
back on the grass, loosened too-tight 
belts, and sighed a wheezy, breathless, 
almost-too-full-for-comfort but not- 
painfully-so chant of 

“A bully dinner, I’ll say!” 


13 


WINDY GETS WIND OF A 
FORTUNE 

"Talking about clams,” spoke up 
Billy, as the Gang lay on the sandy bank 
digesting their dinner of fish of their own 
frying and goodies from the generous 
basket Mrs. Munson had furnished, 
listening to the drowsy roar of the mill- 
dam and the drowsier hum of the 
mill, and chattering over events recent, 
long past, or still to come. 

“Who’s talking about clams, I’d like 
to know?” 

“Reddy Maynard, using one for bait 
and catching a fish with it, too.” 

“Sure he’s talking about them. Why, 
when we’re old fellows with long chin 
whiskers!” (Jap illustrated with a ges¬ 
ture a lengthy flowing beard from jaws 
to belt), “and we meet Reddy—” 


194 


WINDY GETS WIND OF A FORTUNE 195 

“Grandfather Albert Frederick May¬ 
nard,” interrupted Windy. 

“He’ll begin, ‘Remember, boys, the 
time I caught that bullhead without a 
hook, with a big clam for bait?’ ” 

“Sure he will!” 

“’Course 1 will. I’m never going to 
forget that,” grinned Reddy. 

“Yes, but talking about clams,” in¬ 
sisted Billy, “lots of folks gather them 
for the pearls in them.” 

“Pearls?” 

“Sure, to put in jewelry, like dia¬ 
monds, only milky white ’stead of glassy 
bright, and — oh, I made a rime.” 

“Too late to wish on it now, though, 
’cause you kept on talking before you 
stopped to wish.” 

“Yep, can’t wish on a rime if you say 
a single word afterward.” 

“Going on talking queers your luck 
on the wish, sure pop!” 


196 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“What about pearls, though?” 

“Oh, they’re little round gobs of white. 
Mother’s got one in a breastpin. They 
grow in clams, and oysters, and such 
animals, and are valuable when they’re 
made right.” 

“Sure they’re valuable — pearls of 
great price, the Bible calls them.” 

“Sure. Father read about a man find¬ 
ing one worth fifty dollars in a clam — 
a wild clam he caught in this very river, 
only lower down, beyond Cedar Falls.” 

“Ha-ha! Wild at getting caught, 
most likely.” 

“Ha-ha-ha! Wild to see der falls, 
mebbe.” 

“That’s nothing. Uncle Ben knows 
a man that found a pearl worth over 
a hundred dollars, pretty near two hun¬ 
dred, and in a river clam, too.” 

“How do they get into the clams, 
though?” 


WINDY GETS WIND OF A FORTUNE 197 

“Oh, they aren’t in all clams — just 
the ones that get hurt, or something — 
sand, maybe, gets into their bodies and 
they can’t get it out —” 

“Would think they could shake it out 
— stand up on their one foot and flap 
their shells.” 

“Quit your kidding, silly! When a 
grain of sand gets up in their shell and 
they can’t get it out, they make the 
pearl around it, out of the same stuff 
they make their shells of, only nicer, 
like the pinky inside.” 

“I should think every clam could 
have a pearl, then; there’s plenty of 
sand.” 

“Don’t, though. You could hunt 
clams all day, or a month, or a year, 
mebbe, and not find a single pearl. 
Then mebbe the next one would have 
a pearl in it.” 

“Say! Looky! A cornelia!” Windy 


198 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


held up the pebble, of a pretty red color, 
rather pitted on the rounded surface. 

“Where’s the streaks? Show us the 
streaks!” demanded the four, crowding 
around him. 

Windy licked the stone, the prelimi¬ 
nary test for the true carnelian. 

“There now, and there,” he proudly 
pointed out, but when the others hesi¬ 
tated to accept it as a real carnelian, he 
cracked it between two stones. 

“Now look!” he triumphed, for the 
split side showed white wavy lines run¬ 
ning round and round a central spot of 
ruby red. 

“She’s a beauty, and no mistake!” 

“Let’s look for Cornelias!” 

“That’s the—must be thick around 
here!” 

“Who can find the most?” 

“I’ve already got two.” 

“Who can find the biggest one?” 


WINDY GETS WIND OF A FORTUNE 199 

And the carnelian hunt was on. The 
boys started off along the gravelly bank, 
at a crouching gait, all eyes alert for 
similar pebbles. Every stone that was 
chosen as a carnelian must first of all 
be licked to show a wet surface, and if 
no white streaks appeared it had to be 
tossed away. Indeed, many a tongue- 
swipe was wasted on mere pebbles of a 
greasy red or a milky gray. 

Before long, however, Jap had three, 
two reds and a cream-colored one. 
Billy had four, all red, one beautifully 
marked with a cluster of glassy white 
grains. Windy had a pale-rose one and 
a smoky-white one to add to his original 
two, and Reddy and Tiny each had sev¬ 
eral apiece to chink in their pockets, 
though one of Tiny’s collection was 
pronounced a real “cornelia” by only 
one-fifth of the Gang — which fifth may 
be guessed. 


200 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

In this way they wandered down¬ 
stream, around a bend in the river and 
into new territory. Suddenly, nosing 
along on the watch for pebbles, Windy, 
in the lead, commenced sniffing. 

“Whew! What’s that?” 

“Something dead, all right! Wow!” 

“That’s the—” came Billy’s clipped- 
short remark, muffled because of a 
thumb and finger closed tightly around 
his stubby nose. 

“Sniff, sniff!” went Windy, too curi¬ 
ous to object seriously to the strong 
odor of decay that now filled the air. 
The other four, however, putting com¬ 
fort before curiosity, held their noses 
firmly nipped shut and searched only 
with their eyes. 

But this was a mystery best solved by 
the nose, so it happened that Windy 
was the first to locate the source of the 
stench. It was a pile of clams — a 


WINDY GETS WIND OF A FORTUNE 201 

bushel, he declared, though perhaps his 
hat would have held them all. They 
were spread on the dry sand at the end 
of a log whose main bulk ran out into 
the river. Some of the shells were wide 
open and empty; others were open but 
with the dead mollusks still inside. 

“Wow! Talk about pearls!” cried the 
four, and edged away, after one noseful 
of the putrid scent. 

But Windy, like the true scientist, 
did not let his nose rank above his 
brains. He caught up a stick and began 
poking at the scattered heap. 

“Wonder what they’re doing here? 
How did they get here? Why are some 
empty and others not? And here’s a 
fresh one. See, it’s tight shut and a 
little wet yet, though on top of some 
dry ones. Something must bring them 
here, then. They wouldn’t crawl up 
here to die. 


202 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


Then his exploring eye noticed an¬ 
other peculiarity. He caught up one 
of the empty half-shells. 

“Looky! This one’s been gnawed at 
the back!” 

He squatted beside the collection, 
poking about for the mate to this half¬ 
shell. When he found it, he fitted the 
two together, and it was plain to see 
they had been gnawed apart along the 
hinge at the back, by strong, sharp 
teeth. 

“Like a squirrel works on a nutshell,” 
he added, still wondering about the 
mystery. “What eats ’em, do you 
s’pose? Has to be something that can 
dive to get them, swim with them here, 
then gnaw them open.” 

The four now ventured nearer, and 
began to voice their opinions, freely 
spoken, for all they were so muffled in 
enunciation. 


WINDY GETS WIND OF A FORTUNE 203 

“It wouldn’t be a squirrel; it 
wouldn’t dive.” 

“A duck could dive, but it couldn’t 
gnaw.” 

“Turtle, mebbe.” 

“I know. It’s a muskrat’s work. 
Father was reading the other night to me 
out of a liberry book, and it said musk¬ 
rats eat clams; but it didn’t say any¬ 
thing about piling shells up this way.” 

“There’s muskrats in this river. The 
Indians used to come up from Tama 
Reservation every spring to hunt them, 
my father says.” 

Windy, in the meantime, had become 
conscious of a small pebble caught be¬ 
tween his toes. He lifted up his bare 
foot to pick the stone out, hopping up 
and down on the other foot to keep his 
balance. A little decayed clam-meat 
was sticking to the pebble, showing 
plainly how it had got pressed between 


204 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


his toes while he was stepping around 
in the mess of shells and flesh. When 
Windy got a look at the pebble, he held 
it up, eyeing it wonderingly. 

“Say, here’s a funny Cornelia, if it is 
one. Got caught between my little and 
the next toe just now.” 

“Naw, it’s too white for a Cornelia.” 

“Well, show us the streaks in it if 
it’s a Cornelia.” 

“Too round, too.” 

“Wait till I wash it off; it’s got clam 
meat —” 

"Say, Windy, give us a look once. It 
looks like the pearl in Mother’s breast¬ 
pin.” One look and Billy nodded ener¬ 
getically. “Yes-sir-ee! It’s a pearl, sure 
pop!” 

“A pearl!” Windy stared at the 
pinky-white bead. “Say, what do you 
know about that? Stepped right into 
a fortune, didn’t I?” 


WINDY GETS WIND OF A FORTUNE 205 

“If it’s worth fifty dollars, you cer¬ 
tainly did!” 

“Or mebbe a hundred!” 

“Wow! That would be a fortune — 
make you pretty nearly a millionaire.” 

“No, only a hundredaire. Takes lots 
of hundreds to make a million.” 

“Anyway, I’d feel like a millionaire 
with a hundred dollars.” 

“I don’t guess it’s worth even fifty, 
but mebbe it is. It’s about the size of 
the one in Mother’s breastpin, and the 
whole pin only cost twenty dollars.” 

“Well, if it’s worth only twenty 
dollars, or ten, or even only one, it’s 
worth all it cost me to find it.” 

“Mebbe there are some more around 
here.” 

With Tiny’s suggestion the five set 
to work, poking about in the group of 
shells and decaying flesh, all dislike for 
the smelly place quite lost in the desire 


206 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


for pearls, of great price or of any value 
whatsoever. 

But the muskrat’s garbage pile had 
no more such treasures for them; at 
least, their careful search did not result 
in any other reward than the pleasure 
of having searched it thoroughly. 

“Guess you got them all, Windy,” 
they admitted, when they were sure no 
more precious jewels were buried in 
the stale mess. 

“Tell you what, I’ll ask Mr. Grannis 
if it’s worth anything,” Windy said as 
they rambled along back up the shore 
toward the distantly humming mill. 

“Sure, he probably sees lots of them.” 

The miller, however, had not seen 
very many river pearls. He did pro¬ 
nounce Windy’s find to be a pearl, all 
right, but how valuable he couldn’t say, 
not being experienced in such matters. 
It was his opinion that it was not worth 


WINDY GETS WIND OF A FORTUNE 207 

any great amount of money, not being 
overly clear. 

“Pearls the same size may not be 
worth the same money; sometimes a 
small one is worth more than a larger 
one, though of course the highest priced 
ones are large as well as clear and shin¬ 
ing. How’d you run across this, by the 
way?” 

When the boys, all five talking at 
once, but Windy always in the lead, 
told him about the pile of shells, he 
nodded, smiling. 

“You ran across a muskrat’s ‘oyster 
restaurant,’ as I call one of their feeding 
places. Muskrats are so fond of clams 
they take considerable pains to fish for 
them. Many a time along the river 
here I’ve seen a muskrat swim out a 
way, dive, and come up with a clam in 
his jaws. Occasionally, if real hungry 
for clam, a muskrat will stop on the 


208 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


first stone or log or sand bar he comes 
to, to eat his catch. Sitting up on his 
haunches and holding the clam in his 
paws, he will gnaw the shell apart and 
take out the meat, just as a squirrel eats 
a nut. 

"But, as a rule, a certain rat will have 
a certain stone or log, usually on the 
bank, where he carries his clams — his 
oyster or clam restaurant. If he is 
hungry he will eat it right away, but if 
not will often leave it on the sand to 
ripen.” 

“Ripen!” 

“Well, rot, then. You see, up on the 
sand and in the sun, the clam soon dies 
for lack of water; when it is dead, the 
shell opens up as the body loses its 
grip on the two parts. I’ve seen a musk¬ 
rat spend all the forenoon gathering 
clams, piling them up on the sand 
around a stone or log where the sun 


WINDY GETS WIND OF A FORTUNE 209 

would shine on them all day. Then the 
next day, or perhaps the day after, he’d 
come back and eat the meat out of all 
the opened shells. Then maybe he’d 
spend an hour or so replenishing his 
stock of clams — restocking his clam 
restaurant, so to speak.” 

“That’s funny.” 

“Yes, there are many interesting pages 
in the book of nature, if one only has 
the time to read them, or maybe the 
right glasses,” smiled the miller. “As 
for your pearl, bub, I advise you to take 
it to a jeweler and get it valued.” 

“Thank you, I will, sir,” promised 
Windy. 

But, sad to say, Windy was so over¬ 
careful with his treasure that he lost it 
before he even started home with it. 

Hence, like Columbus, and Henry 
Hudson, and many another discoverer 
before him, Windy never learned the 


14 


210 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


real value or nature of the thing he 
happened upon. 

Yet, like his famous fellow dis¬ 
coverers, he had the pleasure of making 
the discovery, which was considerable 
in itself, now wasn’t it? 


REDDY STARTS A RANCH 


“Well, what next?” 

The Gang, gathered on the mill plat¬ 
form, pondered new activities. 

“ ’Tisn’t time to eat again.” 

“Might go in swimming.” 

“No, let’s leave that till afternoon; 
too soon after eating now.” 

“Aw, if we wait till we haven’t had 
anything to eat, we’ll never go.” 

“Tell you what, fellows,” spoke up 
Reddy. “Let’s go farther down the road 
and see what’s there.” 

“Let’s.” 

Down the dusty roadway they started, 
five barefooted boys whose toggery 
showed the wearage and even some tear- 
age of the already long day. But straw 
hats and cloth caps of various shapes 
and colors bobbed happily along, now 


211 


212 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

in shade, now in sunshine, as a big arch¬ 
ing oak on one side of the road gave way 
to a sprayey-branched elm farther along 
on the opposite side. 

They had to stop at the flowing well 
for a drink or two apiece direct from 
the spout, then sauntered on. As they 
went past the shady, level space where 
Old Dan was parked, about halfway 
between the road and the river, the horse 
nickered a sociable “have a good time, 
boys,” as plainly as words could say it. 

Thereupon Jap, as befitted Old Dan’s 
owner for the day, stopped to see that 
the horse was comfortable. He was, 
being unhitched, unharnessed, and tied 
to the back of the spring wagon with a 
rope long enough to let him browse or 
lie down, as he pleased. 

“Old Dan the speed demon,” cheered 
Tiny, giving this hero several friendly 
slaps on the curve of his neck. 


REDDY STARTS A RANCH 


213 


And the others joined in a little trib¬ 
ute to the old fellow’s powers as a 
racer, patting him fondly on nose, 
shoulders, and flanks, which was enjoyed 
by horse as well as boys, judging by the 
way the speed demon rubbed against 
them and nickered back answers to their 
praises. 

Billy, as finder of the black leather 
bag, took a look to see that it was all 
right under the seat of the wagon. 

“S’pose those two men will ever claim 
it?” he wondered. 

“Mebbe. It’s valuable, if it is just 
full of old papers.” 

“Tell you what,” suggested Windy. 
“Might take ’em out now, and have a 
bonfire, and move into the bag our¬ 
selves; put our Cornelias and my pearl, 
and things we find into it.” 

The boys looked at one another, their 
eyes asking, “Shall we? Or dassn’t 


214 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


we?” Then Tiny voiced the general 
dislike of “meddling.” 

“Better not, Windy. They might 
claim it yet, and the re -ward might be 
bigger if we left things alone.” 

“That’s the— ’course it would.” 

“Sure. What’s inside must have some 
value to those that put them there, else 
they wouldn’t have had them along.” 

“That’s so, too.” 

“Uncle Ben’d be awful mad if any 
one meddled with his stuff.” 

“Or anybody else.” 

“Your pearl’s safe enough in your 
pocket. Windy,” they jibed. 

“Say, where d’you suppose that man’s 
gone that got here first? Here’s his 
team, but we haven’t had a sight of him 
for a long time.” 

“Should think his horses’d need water¬ 
ing.” 

“They do. Hear ’em nicker.” 


REDDY STARTS A RANCH 215 

“Let’s water ’em, then.” 

“No, they might run away if we got 
them untied from the wagon.” 

“Where’s the turtle man? He could 
water ’em.” 

“Over on the other side of the river. 
That’s where I saw him last, fishing up 
above the dam.” 

“Here’s his turtle in his wagon,” said 
Reddy, taking a sly peep. “Tail 
still wiggling. Takes him as long as a 
snake to die, doesn’t it?” 

“Sure, a turtle and a snake are rela¬ 
tions; they’re both rep -tiles.” 

“Sure they are.” 

“Think of eating a snake!” 

“Huh! lots of folks do— Indians and 
Hottentots and such wild people. My 
father was reading the other night about 
a white man, a ’splorer, that ate some 
cooked snake, over in Africa, with the 
Hottentots. He said it tasted all right 


216 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


to him—the ’splorer—just like young 
pig meat.” 

“My grandfather knows a man that 
went to an Indian’s camp, and they were 
eating snakes. They offered the man 
some — said it was good — but the man 
didn’t try it.” 

“Uncle Ben knows a fellow that got 
lost in the woods and had to eat — what 
do you s’pose?” 

“Snake?” 

“No, porcupine — ha-ha!” 

"Quills and all?” 

“No, he peeled it, but he said it was 
awfully tough and strong and greasy, 
’cause porcupines eat pine bark and 
needles and such stuff, and it makes 
them fat, but strong.” 

“Say, I know. Let’s water these 
horses with Old Dan’s pail.” 

“Good idea! Let’s!” 

“That’s the— er, sure we can.” 


REDDY STARTS A RANCH 217 

So, before continuing on their way, 
the boys carried water to the team and 
were glad to see them sip it down, nearly 
a pailful apiece. 

“Shouldn’t ought to go off and leave 
them so long without water,” they 
assured one another. 

Off they started once more, and kept 
on for a quarter of a mile perhaps, so 
far, anyway, that the trees hid the mill 
and unless they kept very still they 
could no longer hear its busy hum or 
even the thud of water falling over the 
milldam. 

Finally the zigzag road crossed a very 
small bridge before starting up a rather 
steep hill, to turn at the top right in 
front of a farmer’s gate and ramble on 
in another direction, away from the 
river, through open, sunny country laid 
out in farmland patches. Now the 
bridge was built across a shallow ravine, 


218 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

down which trickled a small flow of 
water. 

“Where do you suppose that water 
comes from?’’ asked Tiny as the five 
paused on the shady bridge to look up 
the wooded ravine. “Everything else 
seems so dry, with no rain for days.” 

“Another flowing well, like the one 
at the mill, mebbe.” 

“Tell you what, let’s go up the gulch 
instead of the road any farther.” 

Reddy’s proposition met with general 
favor, for, while the road stretched 
across country hot and dusty and un¬ 
shaded, the little gully looked cool and 
inviting, with trees up either side and 
that trickle of water like a silvery rib¬ 
bon to mark its deepest part. 

There was a ditch, and a “bob-wire” 
fence to go over and under, with a patch 
of twinkling blue-blossomed plants to 
make the place gay — little low plants 


REDDY STARTS A RANCH 


219 


with long, grasslike leaves in pairs, the 
topmost couple of leaves offering a cozy 
snuggery for the clump of three-cornered 
blue flowers and drooping pinky-blue 
buds that filled the green “dish” like a 
small bouquet in a large vase. 

“Snake’s-eyes!” they cried, and fell 
to gathering the pretty stalks. 

“Are a snake’s eyes blue?” queried 
Billy. 

“Don’t know. Mebbe they’re called 
snake’s-eyes ’cause the juice is so 
slippery.” 

“But a snake isn’t slimy; it’s dry 
when you pick it up out of the grass.” 

“That’s so, only folks that name 
flowers can’t be too choosey.” 

“Say, what do I hear? Listen!” 

“Pe-wee, pe-wee, peer!” came floating 
down from the trees, though whether 
near or far away the boys could n’f say. 

“A pewee bird!” 


220 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“My, it sounds lonesome!” 

“Or sleepy!” 

“Pe-wee, pe-wee, pe-e-e-r!” repeated 
the little bird invitingly. 

The boys at once accepted its invita¬ 
tion, and began peering everywhere for 
the feathered mite. They found it at 
last, too, though it didn’t do one thing 
to help them locate it — a little leaf- 
colored bird with sunny breast perched 
very quietly on a branch near the tree 
trunk, and making its wisp of a voice 
come from far away even though it was 
quite close overhead. 

“Wood pewee, it is,” murmured Tiny. 

“S’pose there’s a nest anywhere 
around?” 

“ ’Course, but be sure he won’t give 
it away, where it is.” 

Such a gentle-voiced, soft-eyed, quiet- 
mannered bird made them feel almost 
like tiptoeing away from the place, and 


REDDY STARTS A RANCH 221 

they did go quietly for a few paces. But 
soon other things claimed their atten¬ 
tion, chiefly the wonder as to what lay 
ahead up the gully, around the bend. 
So presently they were splashing through 
the trickle of water, all noise once more 
— and so all boy, I suppose? 

So quickly did the fragile petals of 
the snake’s-eyes wither that some had 
tossed away their clusters of stalks 
almost before they were out of sight of 
the bridge. Then those who still kept 
their scanty bouquets clutched tightly 
in hot, moist hands threw them away, 
absent-mindedly forgetting all about 
them when Reddy, in the lead, rounded 
the turn in the ravine and called out 
in that tone of renewed interest in 
things: “Looky! A spring! A spout 
spring! Comes right out of the hill!” 

“Hurray!” they yelled, and all started 
on a lively sprint toward it, as if this 


222 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

pleasantly exciting novelty would surely 
escape them if they didn’t make haste. 

Out from the side hill it issued, be¬ 
neath a rock. The owner of the land 
had made a spout of two boards nailed 
together V-wise, to catch the stream and 
carry it into a drinking-trough for 
cattle. One cow was even then drinking 
at this refreshing “soda-fountain” or 
“lemonade-stand” of nature’s and man’s 
contriving; other cattle were lying in the 
shade near by, lazily chewing their cuds. 

As the five came rushing up the ra¬ 
vine, Bossy took her dripping muzzle 
out of the trough and waddled off, as 
much as to say, “Help yourselves, boys, 
the water’s fine!” 

Some of them followed the old cow’s 
example and drank from the trough. 
But Reddy, going around behind the 
low box to drink from the spout, gave a 
yell of discovery. 


REDDY STARTS A RANCH 223 

“Hi, see what I found!” 

Full of wonder, the four joined him, 
to peer down into the moist little hollow 
behind the tank. 

It was shaded by the overhanging 
rock and by the box, and so was kept 
damp with the trickling drops that oozed 
out along the bottom of the spout. It 
was rimmed with grass and bedded with 
fine sand, and altogether was as nice a 
nest as could be desired. And there, 
enjoying the cool, moist, shaded basin, 
were six tiny turtles, huddled together 
in a little group. 

“Snappers, too,” decided the boys, 
for the reptiles were no sooner disturbed 
than, small as they were, they whirled 
about to face the boys, with wide-opened 
mouths. 

“Say, what they doing up here, any¬ 
way?” 

“They want peace and quiet, mebbe.” 


224 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Well, they’ve got it. Couldn’t find 
a better place for it than this.” 

“S’pose the farmer’d buy these, too?” 
exclaimed Reddy. 

“One isn’t big enough to make much 
‘soup of heem,’ but mebbe the whole six 
would be enough.” 

“Tell you what, let’s take ’em down 
to the mill and offer ’em to him.” 

“No, let’s give ’em a chance for their 
lives. Why, they ain’t hardly lived any 
yet.” 

“I know—let’s take ’em home with 
us, and raise ’em. Then, when they get 
big as the one Tiny caught, we can sell 
’em,” proposed Reddy. 

“If we can find anybody to buy ’em.” 

“How we going to catch ’em, though, 
and carry ’em, too?” 

Windy giggled. 

“Each of us can let a turtle nab a 
finger, and carry them that way. Reddy 


REDDY STARTS A RANCH 225 

can carry two, one on each thumb, all 
the way back to Mayville.” 

“Or one on each of his big toes.” 

“Aw!” scoffed Reddy. 

For, tiny as the turtles were, there 
was something warning about the way 
they crouched there facing the boys, six 
in a row, and all open-mouthed, as if 
daring their big enemies to come any 
closer with their bare toes. 

But Reddy, his mind set on starting 
a turtle ranch in a tub in his back yard, 
thought of another scheme. He broke 
a stout twig off a near-by plum tree and 
thrust the end toward a little snapper. 
The turtle made good its name by catch¬ 
ing it with a quick, determined set of his 
small jaws. 

“Aha!” triumphed Reddy. “Get you 
a stick, everybody, and a turtle.” 

So it happened that a procession of 
five boys and six turtles wended its way 


15 


226 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

up the ravine and along the road back 
to the mill, tramp-fashion. That is, 
each boy had a twig over his shoulder, 
to the end of which clung a little snapper, 
like a handkerchief bag on the end of 
a staff. Reddy, the chief owner of the 
new ranch-to-be, had two turtles, one 
over each shoulder. 

“And say, I’ll mark every one on the 
shell with a R. M., and then if they get 
away they’ll be branded, and every¬ 
body’ll know they belong to me, and I 
can get ’em back again.” 

“That’ll be a good scheme,” they 
nodded. 

“ ’Course it will. My father read 
about a man that used to see a turtle 
every year, the same one in about the 
same place, with a W.E.B. on his shell 
— a big old fellow he was, about a hun¬ 
dred years old.” 

“A hundred years!” 


REDDY STARTS A RANCH 


227 


“Do turtles get to be that old?” 

“Say, that’ll make them live longer 
than I will.” 

“Oh, mebbe not. When you get 
whiskers down to your belt, you’ll easy 
be a hundred years.” 

“Lots of folks live more than that.” 

“ ’Course they do.” 

“Grandfather read of a man that was 
a hundred and thirty-one.” 

“My grandfather knew an old Indian 
so old his face was all shriveled up like 
a potato. He’s got his picture, and he 
looks like a withered-up turnip with 
shoebuttons for eyes.” 

“Turtles live older than a hundred, 
too.” 

“Say, Uncle Ben knows about a man 
that found a turtle with a C. C. 1492 on 
its back.” 

“C. C. 1492! Why, that’s Christopher 
Columbus!” 


228 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Say, that’d make the turtle old as 
America.” 

“Fourteen from nineteen — five. He’d 
be over four hundred years old, that 
turtle.” 

“But the turtle was only about fifty 
years old.” 

“Some one else had marked him.” 

“Sure, that’s the joke.” 

There was considerable debate as to 
what to do with Reddy’s live stock. 
Some were for putting them in the bag, 
but it was decided that the owner, if he 
ever claimed it, wouldn’t like to have 
the six little turtles, “clean as can be, 
though,” walking over and among his 
papers. 

“Let’s ask the miller if we ought to 
put them in water or not to get them 
home all right.” 

So the boys trailed up to the mill 
doorway for advice. 


REDDY STARTS A RANCH 229 

“You see, if we feed ’em good, they’ll 
be worth six dollars by fall,” gloated 
Reddy the turtle-rancher. “And we’ll 
keep all their little ones, too,_ and sell 
them for a dollar apiece when they get 
big enough.” 

“If you’ve the patience to wait that 
long,” said the miller, with twinkling 
eyes. “You see, it takes a long time 
for turtles to grow up. One of these tiny 
things won’t be laying eggs for years, 
yet. A turtle is one of the slowest grow¬ 
ing animals known — slower even than 
the elephant, and that animal must be 
about thirty years old before it can pro¬ 
duce young.” 

Reddy scratched his head, then 
shrugged his shoulders. 

“I guess they’ll be too much bother 
to take them home, then. Tell you 
what, let’s mark ’em on the shell, 
though, then take ’em back where we 


230 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

found ’em. Here, every one of you can 
have your own, to put ’nitials on. Then, 
whenever we come here and see one of 
these turtles, we’ll know it. It won’t 
hurt to cut their shells, will it, Mr. 
Grannis?” 

“No, the shell is nothing but hornlike 
material. I’ll put your initials on for 
you, if you like.” 

With occasional stops to “go look 
after things,” and with always an ear 
on the humming machinery, the miller 
spent some time at the task. He drew 
his chair out on the porch, the one he 
always kept near the doorway. It was 
one he had made out of a barrel by cut¬ 
ting some of the staves through around 
the middle of the cask, leaving others 
for the back; it had a sack nailed across 
for a seat, and a bag of bran for a 
cushion, and was indeed as good a chair 
as any, as far as comfort was concerned. 


REDDY STARTS A RANCH 231 

The boys thought it a very wonderful 
invention; surely it was a clever and 
unique one. 

Holding first one little snapper and 
then another on his knee, he deftly cut 
a R. M or a W. H., or a J. AT, or a 
B. B., or a T. L., or another R. AT, in 
the soft but unfeeling shells. The little 
snappers never moved once. Holding 
tightly to the things they had thought 
were going to hurt them, they seemed 
to have no fear that anything else could 
hurt them. There isn’t such a large 
amount of brains in a turtle’s skull, 
you know. 

When each was marked, with sticks 
over shoulders, or carried parasol-wise, 
or swung cane-fashion, the boys took the 
tiny reptiles back to the cosy place 
where they had found them. 

“That’s where they want to be most 
of all,” they agreed, with that merciful 


232 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


regard for the rights of dumb animals 
that no boy should ever overlook. 

“Sure. It’s as good a ranch as any,” 
conceded Reddy, almost as glad to see 
the turtles back in their moist den as 
they were to be there. 

“Now let’s go away so they’ll get 
over their scare and let loose of these 
sticks,” suggested Jap. 

“Let’s!” agreed the others. 

And with the word the Gang got 
under way, headed for new adventures. 


AN ILL WINDY 


“Let’s go on farther up the gully,” 
proposed Windy as the five turned away 
from the spring. 

The wooded patch did promise enter¬ 
tainment, so they began their ramble 
with eyes on the lookout for whatever 
new thing might come to view. 

First was that clump of wild plum 
trees, about and beyond the spring. But, 
though some of the fruit was pinkish on 
one side, all the plums were too unripe 
for even a boy’s willing appetite. They 
shook the trees, and got quite a hail¬ 
storm of hard fruit in reply, but that 
was all the fun the grove offered them. 

“Wow! No good!” exclaimed Windy, 
after trying his third bite at his third 
plum from the handful he had gathered 
with great hopes. Still he tried a fourth, 


233 


234 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

hoping against experience that the little 
red spot on one cheek would be more 
sweet than puckery. 

“Wow!” it made him gasp, and he 
had to toss it aside, also. 

“Don’t keep tasting them,” advised 
Jap, who after the first disappointing 
nibble had thrown away the few he had 
picked up. 

Very slowly Windy decided to take 
that advice, examining each plum, how¬ 
ever, before tossing it aside, to be cer¬ 
tain it wasn’t a bit redder and softer 
and riper than the others had been; dis¬ 
appointed because it never was. 

However, he was soon comforted by 
the discovery of a new tidbit, a wild 
sarsaparilla plant, with its long¬ 
stemmed single leaf of many bronze- 
green leaflets held parasol-like over its 
flower stalk, which also sprang from 
the ground close beside the leafstalk, but 


AN ILL WINDY 


235 


was topped with three balls of fluffy 
whitish blossoms. 

“Hey, wild sars’paril’!” he cried, and, 
dropping on his knees beside the pretty 
plant, he started digging at the root 
with his much-nicked knife blade. 

“Wild sars’paril’!” echoed the others, 
and they too commenced work at the 
base of the two stalks. 

Soon the Gang was dragging from the 
earth a long, rope-like root, which, in¬ 
stead of coming to an early end, kept 
tearing back more and more of the loose 
soil that covered it. 

“My, it’s a big one!” they rejoiced, 
and they continued to pull with might 
and main until suddenly it gave way, 
tumbling them over in all directions. 

“Ha-ha-ha!” they roared, for on this 
wonderful day almost every experience 
that came their way was great sport. 

Soon each had a foot or more of the 


236 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

root, scraped down far enough to permit 
a good bite to be nipped off; then they 
went on their way, chewing at the tasty, 
spicy cut, while scraping another stretch 
of root, to have it ready for a fresh chew 
when the first should lose its zest. 

They found wild crab apples, and 
hazelnuts, both too green to be eaten; 
also wild grapevines, loaded with fruit, 
yet offering them nothing satisfactory 
in the way of refreshments. Windy 
nibbled samples of each, but had to give 
them up as valueless, at least in their 
present stage of growth. 

“Say, you’ll be sick if you don’t stop 
eating everything you see,” warned Jap. 

"Aw! nothing ever made me sick,” 
retorted Windy. 

“Look out! Poison ivy!” cried Tiny, 
darting aside from the vine he had dis¬ 
covered; for he had once been poisoned 
by the weed, and now its glistening, 


AN ILL WINDY 


237 


greasy, three-parted leaves and its 
clusters of whitish berries had no charms 
for him — only alarms. 

“Say, Windy! There’s something you 
dassn’t tackle,” chortled Reddy. 

“No, nor nobody else,” Windy dodged 
that dare. 

They worked their way to the end of 
the little wood, where they stopped for 
a bit in the shade of some burr oaks to 
look out upon the clover field beyond, 
with butterflies fluttering over its purple 
surface like the spirits of the blossoms 
taking flight. 

“Smell it!” they exclaimed, drinking 
deep of the rich perfume the wind 
wafted gently across to them. 

Through the barbed-wire fence they 
snatched off blossom heads, to suck out 
the honey while wandering back along 
the way they had come. 

They stopped for a drink at the 


238 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


spring, and for a peep at the turtles, 
once more grown sensible, now off their 
switches and cuddled cozily together 
under the drip of the trough. 

“Look, they got me in the middle,” 
laughed Billy, by which he meant that 
the turtle labeled B. B. was in the center 
of the little group, with T. L., J. M., 
IV. H., and the two R. M.’s forming a 
ring about him. 

On toward the bridge, past the wood 
pewee grove, now noisy with a vireo’s 
incessant call of “See me! Look at me! 
See me!” though he flitted from twig 
to twig so rapidly, and was so like the 
color of a leaf himself, that it was much 
easier to hear than to see him. 

They followed the gully under the 
little bridge, and the excursion was 
worth it, too, for where one mossy rock 
jutted out over another, in a built-up 
wall forming the approach to the bridge. 


AN ILL WINDY 


239 


was the daintiest nest imaginable — the 
pretty cradle of the phoebe, or water 
pewee, or bridge pewee, as the bird is 
variously called. 

On the outside the nest was overlaid 
with green moss; on the inside it was 
lined with horsehair; in it were four 
pure-white eggs, as delicate as though 
made of chalk dust and milk, just 
freckled with brown. 

While the boys were peeping into it, 
as they could do by climbing up a couple 
of stones, step-like, the mother returned, 
to perch on a near-by ledge of rock and 
to “be-be-be” to them most pleadingly. 
There was nothing gay about her coat 
to win them, for she was a very plain 
brown-gray creature, with a buffy 
breast; but even if they had intended 
to harm her nest, which they did not, 
her coaxing chirps would have made 
them want to please her. 


240 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

Soon they were on their way toward 
the river. Then, on the top of a little 
knoll just where the ravine ran down 
into the river, Windy discovered some¬ 
thing really edible. 

“Hey! Chokecherries!” 

“Hurray! Choke-’ems!” rejoiced the 
four. 

The fruit was in that most delightful 
stage of ripeness chokecherries can be, 
too — past the crimson, even the bright 
red hue, and into the ruby stage of color. 
That is when they have the acid tang 
that makes the chokecherry quite a 
different fruit from any other wild 
cherry, yet they have lost the extreme 
puckeriness that makes them almost 
unedible in the light red, or just-getting- 
ripe, season. Later, when they are 
almost black with ripeness, they are too 
tame, too mushy, too mealy, too taste¬ 
less. Ruby red, they are “just right.” 


AN ILL WINDY 


241 


The slender little trees were full of 
tantalizing bunches of the glowing fruit 
that shone in the sunshine like so many 
drops of jelly threaded on green stems. 

“Gimme a boost, fellows,” called 
Windy, making for the nearest tree. 
“I’ll bend down the top, then you can 
all help yourselves.” 

“Only we mustn’t break it,” worried 
Reddy. 

“No, when I get up it I’ll sneak out 
to where I can bend it over, then you 
can catch the branches and help.” 

Everyone boosted, and up went 
Windy, sampling the fruit as soon as 
he got up among the lowermost clusters. 
But Windy’s weight, even out as far as 
he dared go, wouldn’t bring the tree 
top within reach of their eager hands. 
So between bites Windy tossed down 
bunches to the others, and the delicious 
feast was on. 


16 


242 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

Eventually, however, each boy had 
to have a tree to himself; there was too 
long a wait between bites, this way. So, 
with boosts and hoists from the others, 
up they went. Tiny generously made 
himself the last one, for, being the 
longest-legged of them all, he said he 
could get up best without help. He made 
his tree, too, with a stump and a braced 
log for stair steps. 

“My, choke-’ms the best fruit I 
know,” muttered Windy, with his mouth 
full. 

“Yes, only they make me feel so 
puckery in the throat,” objected Billy 
meekly. 

“Oh, I don’t mind that.” 

“Me, neither. Why, they wouldn’t 
be chokecherries if they didn’t choke.” 

“My mother makes the best choke- 
cherry jelly ever. Wish I had a pail. 
I’d take some home to her.” 


23 


AN ILL WINDY 


243 


“Me, too. My Father says it’s his 
favo rite pie.” 

“I like chokecherry pie all right, but 
my favo rite’s apple pie, with ice cream.” 

“All over mud,” giggled Tiny, his 
way of making a joke out of a la mode, 
as pie with ice cream is called. 

“Wow! I’m getting so puckered I can 
hardly swallow.” 

“Not me! I don’t mind the pucker 
a bit.” 

“It’ll be lots worse, too, after you 
have a drink.” 

“Sure, water makes your mouth 
pucker something terrible.” 

“Say, I can scrape the pucker-stuff 
right off my tongue, thick as mud,” 
discovered Billy, using a little twig for 
a scraper. 

“Fellows! How many choke-’ems 
can you eat at once?” Windy chal¬ 
lenged them. 


244 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Ten!” 

“Dozen!” 

“Fifteen!” 

“Two dozen!” 

The challenge found plenty of con¬ 
testants. Hastily bunches of ripe choke- 
cherries were stripped of their fruit, the 
number of berries counted, and the 
whole palmful popped into a widely 
gaped mouth. 

“1 can hold a dozen, easily,” an¬ 
nounced Tiny. 

“Oh, you got to eat them, chew them, 
pit them, and swallow the rest,” Windy 
stipulated. 

“Well, I can do all that with a dozen.” 
Tiny had transferred the handful back 
to his palm to have room for speaking, 
then, putting them back again, he 
started chewing, pitting, and swallow¬ 
ing the whole dozen at once. 

The number mounted up with each 


AN ILL WINDY 


245 


fresh mouthful counted out. Windy 
safely disposed of twenty-one, Jap beat 
him by two, then Reddy raised the 
number by three, Billy announced 
twenty-seven, Tiny got thirty into his 
mouth by yawning wide. 

“Thirty-two!” cried Windy; but he 
had to hold his hand over his mouth 
until he could get the-cherries snugly 
tucked away in the corners of his cheeks 
before he could safely start chewing on 
them; as for pitting them, that was an 
exertion that made him red in the face 
and popeyed. He had to be very care¬ 
ful that nothing but a pit was going 
to slip out when he opened a narrow 
crack between his lips at one corner of 
his mouth. 

Jap counted out thirty-three, but 
when he got them almost to his mouth 
he shook his head. 

“No use. 1 could swallow them, pits 


246 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


and all, mebbe, but I never could work 
all those pits around to the front of my 
mouth and get them out through my 
teeth.” 

“Can’t swallow the pits, my mother 
says,” warned Reddy. “Give you ’pen- 
dicitis.” 

Windy was chewing slowly away on 
his big mouthful, easing the strain by 
a pit or two every few seconds. 

“Well, I’ll try thirty-three. Mustn’t 
let Windy win,” cried Tiny, and in went 
that number. 

Windy looked popeyed; but he began 
gathering another handful even while 
working on his thirty-two. So he no 
sooner had swallowed his pitted cherries 
to the last skin than he had another 
mouthful ready. 

“Thirty-five,” he announced, and even 
counted them again to make sure of the 
number. He had purposely made it two 


AN ILL WINDY 


247 


more than Tiny’s, to win the contest. 
He had trouble working them into his 
mouth, but did so with a little patience, 
and started in to make good his prom¬ 
ises. 

Tiny gathered thirty-six, then threw 
them all away. 

“You win, Windy,” he groaned. 

“You win,” conceded the others. 

Windy grinned in triumph, as much 
as he could afford to let his mouth 
stretch in a grin under the circum¬ 
stances. 

But what a victory it was! For 
presently, having pitted and swallowed, 
or at least swallowed, the thirty-five, 
and returned to plain eating, say just 
one bunch of cherries at a time, he 
slipped down the little tree. He did it 
quietly, so as not to attract attention, 
but started off with his hands on his 
stomach, and humped over as in pain. 


248 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


The boys heard him groaning softly to 
himself as he hobbled away. 

“Say, you sick, Windy?” called Reddy. 

“Sick? Why shouldn’t he be?” 
taunted Jap. 

“Looky, he’s green around the gills,” 
cried Tiny. 

“Thirty-five,” teased Billy, and he 
pretended to fill his mouth with cherries. 

“Wow!” groaned Windy. “Don’t — 
ever — say — choke-’ems — to me — 
again. Oh!” 

He rubbed his waist between his neck¬ 
tie and his trousers belt with both hands, 
groaning hollowly and with his face 
twisted in misery. He crouched over, 
hugging himself with pain. He danced 
a little jig, in sorrow, not in joy. At 
last, he ran to a stump and threw him¬ 
self over it, stomach down, heels wag¬ 
ging frantic distress signals. 

“Say, he is sick, fellows!” 


AN ILL WINDY 


249 


“Mebbe he swallowed some pits and 
he’s getting the ’pendicitis.” 

“And he’ll have to have an opera¬ 
tion.” 

“And go to the hospital at Dow City.” 

“Say, we got to help him, quick.” 

The boys began shinning down their 
trees, to rally to the aid of their afflicted 
comrade. 

“We’ll hafto carry him to the wagon.” 

“And hitch up Old Dan, and—” 

“And get him to the hospital, and —” 

“And ’phone his folks, and —” 

But hardly were they out of their 
trees, when good old Mother Nature, 
who is often much kinder to her children 
than they are to themselves, came to 
Windy’s help, so that presently he 
had “unswallowed” his record-breaking 
mouthfuls of cherries much faster than 
they had gone down. 

The boys were sympathetic until 


250 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


Windy got to his feet, rubbing his eyes 
with his handkerchief. Then, the danger 
over, they had to tease him a bit. 

"An ill Windy,” laughed Jap, and the 
others joined in merrily. 

“Thought nothing ever made you 
sick?” 

“Say, can you swallow thirty-six and 
keep ’em down?” 

“Bet you can’t even do thirty-five 
again.” 

Windy, humped rather weakly on the 
stump, grinned wanly. 

“Served me right for being a pig,” he 
confessed. 

"You sure were an ill Windy for a 
while, though.” 

“Wow, I sure was!” he agreed with a 
wry face, that made them all laugh. 

“Well, I guess everybody’s had 
enough chokecherries for one day,” 
ventured Tiny. 


AN ILL WINDY 


251 


“I’ll say they have,’’ chorused the 
four. 

But, though they left the little grove 
of chokecherries behind as they strolled 
millward, they had not seen all of that 
fruit they were to see that day. For, 
as they neared the mill, the man who 
had been gone all morning was back, 
untying his horses to lead them to water. 

“Hello!” he called. Then with a gen¬ 
erous swing of his arm he motioned to 
two great tin pails full of fruit sitting 
on the ground near his wagon. “Want 
some chokecherries? Help yourselves 
if you do.” 

They could hardly keep from bursting 
out laughing at the look on Windy’s 
face; they did let themselves titter 
softly, so the man wouldn’t hear them. 

“If you don’t mind,” spoke up Jap, 
with a mischievous grin at Windy, “we 
would like thirty-five.” 


252 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Thirty-five!” The man gave them 
a sharp look, and must have suspected 
some mischief in those four giggling 
boys and the one sober-faced, red-faced 
one. “What do you mean, thirty-five? 
Help yourselves, anyway. I got in¬ 
terested in picking them and have more 
than my wife will want to bother with.” 

“No, thanks, mister,” said Tiny. 
“We’ve been eating some. We found a 
little grove of trees down the river, and 
got filled up on them.” 

“In that case there isn’t room for 
seven more apiece, 1 suppose,” nodded 
the man, starting for the well with his 
horses. 

“No, sir,” laughed the Gang, Windy 
loudest of all. 


TINY TAKES A TUMBLE 


“What time is it getting to be, any¬ 
way?” wondered Jap. 

The boys were gathered in the road 
near the flowing well, doing nothing for 
the moment, strange to say. They had 
had some cool drinks to go with the 
cookies they had taken from the big 
lunch basket, and were ready for some¬ 
thing else to do. 

“Well, it’s afternoon, anyway,” 
guessed Windy. 

“Mebbe so, but it’s early yet,” cor¬ 
rected Jap. 

“Sure, lots of time to do things,” put 
in Reddy. 

“That’s the— And lots more things 
to do,” added Billy. 

“Not more’n two o’clock, I’d say,” 
hazarded Windy. 


253 


254 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

Four of the quintette were studying 
the sun, still riding high in the sky; two 
of them were spanning the distance to 
the horizon by handbreadths. 

But Tiny had pulled his watch and 
chain carefully from his waist pocket. 
Being the only one in the crowd, it de¬ 
served careful handling, you see. It 
would keep good time, too, if it were 
only well shaken frequently, and as 
often reset. Tiny faithfully did this 
every time he remembered it, by guess 
when he had no better guide. 

“Twelve-thirty by my watch and 
chain,” he announced loudly. 

“Huh, by the chain, then!” grunted 

Jap. 

“Why, ’twas past twelve long ago by 
the mill clock!” objected Billy. “I 
looked in when Mr. Grannis was mark¬ 
ing the turtles, one of Reddy’s.” 

“Well,” admitted Tiny, gently shaking 


TINY TAKES A TUMBLE 255 

his valued if valueless timepiece, “I 
haven’t set it for quite a while now. I’ll 
go see what time it is.” 

“And keep shaking that tin lizzie after 
you do set it,” came a friendly shot from 
the rear as he climbed the mill porch 
at the steepest corner rather than wait 
to go around to the steps. 

When Tiny found the boys again, 
they were down below the mill, by the 
water’s edge, hard at work at a game 
of skipping stones, which everyone 
can’t do. 

To play it successfully, one must first 
use great care in selecting the “skipper,” 
which should be a flat, roundish, coin¬ 
like pebble, not too small to toss and 
with weight enough to cut through the 
air, yet not so large that its own weight 
interferes with its progress over the 
water. Next, it must be taken just so 
between thumb and finger, horizontally, 


256 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

so its flat surface will strike the water. 
Then the arm must be swung back for 
good starting speed, and brought for¬ 
ward with a quick snap of the wrist, 
while the stone is set free with a spin¬ 
ning, not a tumbling, motion of its own. 
It must also be given a line of travel 
that will carry it far over water, yet 
very close to it. Now try it! It is quite 
an art, though, to give a stone such a 
start that it will keep bounding on and 
on in one skip after another. 

Jap started the game, which his father 
had taught him. It didn’t take long for 
the rest to learn it, until within a short 
time he had to look to his laurels, as the 
saying goes. Even Tiny, the last to get 
started at it, was soon making his 
“skippers” go whizzing low over the 
river, in bounding leaps, a light splash 
for each time it struck the water. 

After all had learned to throw their 


TINY TAKES A TUMBLE 


257 


pebbles so they would bounce up from 
the water instead of sinking plump 
down, the contest settled into a trial of 
who could make a stone do the most 
skips. Four, five, six, even ten bounces 
before the “skippers” disappeared far 
out in the river, were tallied, four skips 
being common, ten uncommon. 

Still the boys hadn’t played the stone¬ 
throwing game out. 

“Who can send one clear across the 
river?” challenged Tiny. 

The boys set to with a will. Before 
long it became necessary to establish 
the rule: “No fair getting your toes 
wet when you throw”; for, when wading 
out as far as rolled-up trouser legs would 
permit was allowed, long-legged Tiny 
had an advantage over the rest. Then, 
to win the coveted record, the boys 
began looking for dry spots that jutted 
out into the river. 


17 


258 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

Finally, after several rounds, when it 
came Tiny’s turn to toss he giggled mis¬ 
chievously. For he had thought of a 
place no one else had tried — the roots 
of the elm where he had been standing 
when he caught his turtle. They made 
a sort of bracket over the water where 
they curved out and down, and there 
Tiny took his stand. 

“No fair! No fair getting out there!” 
challenged Reddy. 

“My feet aren’t in the water,” 
counter-challenged Tiny. 

That was true, though his two big 
toes were within an inch of it as it 
swirled over the roots on its way from 
the boiling tailrace. 

So finally it was agreed he could toss 
from there — that they’d all toss from 
there, to get an even start. 

Tiny drew back his arm, crouched 
low to give his pebble all the speed 


TINY TAKES A TUMBLE 259 

possible, and put every bit of strength 
he possessed into the fling. 

The four others, on the bank close 
to the tree, each with a handful of 
choice pebbles he had gathered, to say 
nothing of all pockets full, watched with 
interest the progress of Tiny’s “skipper.” 
Merrily it bounded along, striking the 
water one, two, three, four, five times be¬ 
fore it sank just short of the farther shore. 

“Farthest yet!” they shouted, as much 
to be heard above the hum of the mill 
and the swish of the milldam, as be¬ 
cause they were excited and would 
naturally shout. 

“You win, so far!” 

“Lemme skip from there, too!” 

The boys turned to Tiny, three of 
them to congratulate him, Reddy to 
claim that vantage point for his turn. 

“Why!” 

“Where’s Tiny?” 


260 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“In the river!” 

“Tumbled in head first!” 

“Looky! He’s in the river, all but 
his heels!” 

That was true, or nearly so. A pair 
of wildly kicking legs were thrust up 
from that shelf of roots where Tiny had 
been standing a moment before; the 
whereabouts of the rest of him could be 
guessed from their general position. 

As one, his four pals tried and true 
sprang to his rescue. Windy and Jap 
both got hold of the waving leg nearest 
the mill race, and started pulling up¬ 
stream; Reddy and Billy caught the 
other leg and began pulling downstream. 
But Tiny didn’t come, didn’t budge an 
inch, in spite of their wild jerks. 

“Say, what’s the matter?” 

“He’s caught!” 

“Must be hanging on to the roots 
down under the water!” 


TINY TAKES A TUMBLE 261 

“Then he’ll drownd sure if we don’t 
haul him out, and mighty quick.” 

“Looky, he is hanging on!” 

Leaning over the water, now lit up 
by the rays of the afternoon sun, and 
so made partly transparent, the boys 
discovered that Tiny was in great 
danger. For by gripping tightly to the 
roots, as they could see he was doing, 
he could easily hold himself under, pull 
as hard as they might. 

“Say, he’ll drownd, sure.” 

“Get poles and pry him loose!” 

“Run for the miller!” 

“No time for that. Pull hard, every¬ 
body! Yank hard on his legs!” 

“That’s the—Pull! Everybody!” 

“Make him come!” 

He did come, all at once, to their sur¬ 
prise and relief, “from the roots,” so to 
speak, in answer to their frantic tugs. 

And then they nearly drowned him 


262 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

for certain, for, two pulling one side of 
the tree trunk and two the other, they 
dragged him up as far as his legs could 
clasp the tree, where he stuck, on his 
stomach, his face still in the water. 

“Leggo!” shouted Windy. “Leggo, 
you two! Throw his leg around the 
tree. Now! Pull, Jap!” 

With a mighty heave, he and Jap had 
Tiny up so he still lay on the roots of 
the tree, the top of his head quite in the 
water but his nose high enough now to 
start breathing if he ever was going to. 
And as he began kicking and snorting 
they knew he was safe, though the 
four didn’t stop their sturdy tugging 
until they had him on the sand in the 
sun below the elm. 

Tiny sputtered, took a long breath, 
then another. 

“Wipe out his eyes!” 

“Roll him on a barrel!” 


TINY TAKES A TUMBLE 263 

“What do you think? He’s got his 
old watch in his hand!” 

“Get the water out-a him! Roll 
him over!” 

“His watch! How’d that get there?” 

“Then he didn’t tumble in a-tall!” 

“He was holding his breath all the 
time, and reaching around for that old 
tin turnip!” 

By this time Tiny was sitting up, 
snorting, wiping his eyes, and otherwise 
acting like a person half drowned. 

“Say, what do you mean, scaring us 
that way?” 

“And just for that old tin lizzie of 
yours?” 

Tiny opened his eyes as wide as he 
could, and answered them glare for 
glare. 

“Say, what you mean, yanking at me 
that way? You nearly pulled me out 
before I got hold of it.” 


264 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Then why didn’t you tell us you was 
going to dive for that old piece of junk!” 

“We thought sure you was drownd- 
ing.” 

“We sure did, Tiny.” 

“Sure we did. We thought you were 
hanging on to those roots down under 
the water, and would drownd yourself, 
sure, before we could get you out.” 

Tiny looked at his dripping watch 
and chain mournfully. 

“Guess it’ll never run again,” he 
wailed, when a good shake failed to set 
it ticking. 

“All that scare for that old thing!” 

“We thought ’course you’d tumbled 
in.” 

“Oh, 1 tumbled all right, if that’ll 
satisfy you any,” Tiny spoke up. “Went 
in head first, too. But while 1 was fall¬ 
ing I felt my watch and chain slip out-a 
my waist pocket. Mother doesn’t let 


TINY TAKES A TUMBLE 


265 


me fasten the chain in my waist button¬ 
holes ’cause it tears ’em out too much. 
So I took a good breath while 1 was 
tumbling, and went on after the watch.” 

“Goodness! I’m shaking yet, I got 
such a scare.” 

“Me, too.” 

“Why, we saw you hanging on to the 
roots.” 

“My father says a drownding person 
does hang on to things, that way, and 
hold themselves under, and—” 

“They do, too. Uncle Ben saved a 
kid once that tumbled into a river, and, 
say —” 

“My grandfather saved my mother 
when she was a baby. She walked off 
the porch right into the rain barrel, head 
first, and—” 

“And the kid had his hands full of 
weeds, Uncle Ben said. He’d-a held 
himself under, too—” 


266 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“My mother didn’t have any weeds 
to hang on to, but her toes caught on 
the edge of the rain barrel, and Grand¬ 
father saw them, and got her out just 
in time.” 

The kid ’ud-a drownded, sure, if Uncle 
Ben hadn’t-a got there when he did.” 

“Well, ’twas better Tiny fooled us 
than if we’d-a thought he was fooling, 
and it’d-a turned out he wasn’t.” 

“Sure, ’twas.” 

“And, from the way your heels were 
wagging, how was we to tell you wasn’t 
drownding?” 

“’Course we did. That’s why we 
yanked on you so hard.” 

“Nearly split him in two, too, around 
the tree.” 

“That kid Uncle Ben saved was kick¬ 
ing his heels, too; that’s the way he hap¬ 
pened to see him. He would-a drownded, 
too, if Uncle Ben —” 


TINY TAKES A TUMBLE 


267 


“How was we to know you wasn’t 
all in?” 

“If Uncle Ben hadn’t-a run quick and 
pulled him out, weeds and all. They 
had to roll him on a barrel to get the 
water out he’d swallowed, before they 
could get him to come to.” 

“My mother wasn’t kicking; she was 
caught by the toes.” 

“Well, we can be thankful no one’s 
hurt this time.” 

“Except the watch.” 

“The chain’s all right, or will it rust?” 

“My, but you must-a thought quick 
to get your watch before it could go to 
the bottom. The water’s deep by this 
elm.” • 

“They say a fellow does think quick 
under water.” 

“’Specially if he’s about to lose a good 
watch and chain.” 

“Why, Uncle Ben said that kid he 


268 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


saved thought it was the next day when 
he came to.” 

"How did you do it, again now. 
Tiny?” 

"Why, I felt my watch and chain slip 
out, so I just held my breath, and opened 
my eyes, and hung on to the roots till 
I found them. The chain was caught 
on a root lower down. But you fellows 
nearly pulled me out too soon. I had 
to hang on tight to keep you from 
dragging me out before I could reach 
hold of the chain.” 

“Well, you’re safe now.” 

"And your old tin lizzie of a watch!” 

“Yes, mebbe I can tinker it up so 
it’ll run good as before,” nodded Tiny. 

“Sure you can,” giggled the four. 


BILLY GETS BITTEN 


“Say, fellows,” spoke up Billy, while 
Tiny still mourned his water-soaked 
watch — to say nothing of the chain this 
time — and the remainder of the Gang 
stood or lolled on the sand doing abso¬ 
lutely nothing, and enjoying it, too, as 
boys can so easily do. “If we’re going 
in swimming, it’s time we’re getting 
at it.” 

“I’ve been in,” tittered Tiny. 

“Sure, let’s go now, while Tiny’s 
clothes are drying.” 

“And his watch and chain.” 

“Whoop-ee! Come on, everybody!” 

“Race you to the wagon!” 

Up the bank they padded, making a 
game out of even this small bit of ma¬ 
terial, boy-fashion. As the five pack¬ 
ages of bathing suits, or what served 


269 


270 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

for them, had been tied together, to 
make one bundle of them, there was a 
little delay at this point, since the knots 
had been tied so well it took several 
pairs of nails and sets of teeth to start 
them loose. 

When the packages were get-at-able, 
the boys darted off into the bushes to 
change. Tiny spread his “real” clothes, 
which the boys jokingly called his “div¬ 
ing suit,” on the bushes in the sun to 
dry, also his cherished watch and chain. 
Windy, as the possessor of a pearl of 
what he hoped would be a good price, 
wouldn’t trust this valuable to his 
pockets, fearing it would get lost in all 
this taking off and putting on and toss¬ 
ing about of garments. So he popped 
it into his mouth for safe-keeping. At 
that, he wasn’t the last one to get into 
the water. 

For a time they splashed and paddled, 


BILLY GETS BITTEN 


271 


half wading, half floating, walking more 
than swimming, except Tiny, who really 
could swim, and Windy who said he 
could swim if the water wasn’t too deep. 

“Tell you what, let’s go out on the 
milldam, down below, where the water 
doesn’t cover the boards much,” Jap 
suggested. 

“Do we dare?” 

“Sure, I’ve been out there before,” 
announced Tiny. 

“But you can swim, if you get washed 
off.” 

“No need to get washed off.” 

“Come on. I dare.” 

“Me, too.” 

There was a great willow that leaned 
a large branch out over the milldam, 
on the opposite or Mayvilleward bank, 
and from that it was easy to get down 
on the planking at the foot of the fall, 
which caught the water after its several 


272 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

foot tumble, and which the miller called 
the milldam’s “apron.” 

There they romped and raced and 
tagged one another, behind the curtain 
of falling water, in front of it, or in and 
out of it, the full length of the milldam. 
At one place, near the middle, the water 
came over in a broad, thick stream. 
There they could dodge behind the roar¬ 
ing curtain. At other places the top of 
the dam was higher, and the water either 
flowed around to a lower place or merely 
trickled over in slender, silvery ribbons. 

“Say, kids— !” Windy stopped with 
a gurgle and a wild whoop, as he sprang 
to the rescue of his precious pearl. 

For, when he opened his mouth, to 
call something not nearly so worth while 
as the pearl, but which must be whooped 
forth because it had popped into his 
mind, out leaped the pearl as though it 
had been awaiting this chance to escape. 


BILLY GETS BITTEN 273 

Windy bewailed his loss, and even 
moped over it, for some time. 

“If only l’d-a kept my mouth shut!” 

“Which you might-a known you 
couldn’t do, when you put your old 
pearl into it,” was the only consolation 
this phase of his regret brought him. 

Perhaps this loss was not the great 
misfortune it seemed. Perhaps, had the 
pearl proved to be of value, Windy 
would have spent the remainder of his 
life gathering and opening clamshells, in 
a search for more wealth of the same 
kind. He might have become a pearl 
miser, you see, instead of a useful man. 
This is all guesswork, of course, but 
there’s no use crying over spilt milk, or 
lost pearls, or strayed dollars, or what 
might have been. What is and has been 
is always so much better for us, depend 
upon it, than any “supposes” or 
“maybes.” 


18 


274 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


After the boys had romped about 
on the milldam apron, they decided to 
work down the river a way, on the side 
they had not yet explored, beyond where 
Reddy caught his bullhead. 

So, still in their trunks, or whatever 
old clothes they were using for trunks, 
they started off, sometimes wading, 
sometimes swimming or pretending to 
swim, at times strolling along the bank. 

One bend in the river, then another, 
and they discovered a bayou, or sort of 
shut-in bay, with a fringe of willows on 
a sand bar to cut it off from the river 
except at the upper end, where there was 
a gap for the water to flow in. 

“Water lilies! Whoop-ee! Water 
lilies! White ones!” bugled Reddy, who 
at the time they rounded this bend was 
at the head of the procession. 

There the blossoms floated like sail¬ 
boats the fairies had anchored in this 



Whoop-ee! Water lilies! White ones!" bugled Reddy 




276 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

out-of-the-way place for safe-keeping 
until they should go for a moonlight sail 
down the river, or perhaps an aerial 
flight on white fog banks the country 
over. 

The bayou was almost covered with 
their green pads and white blossoms, 
with reeds along the shore, also cat-tails 
and water grasses, and in the small open 
places between them the green film of 
scum that comes on stagnant pools dur¬ 
ing the long warm days of summer. 

But the boys didn’t care for that. 
They couldn’t hurt their clothes, and 
could wash off afterward. And water 
lilies were treasures too inviting to 
pass by. 

So through the soft muck and ooze 
they waded, out toward the blossoms, 
which always take good care to anchor 
themselves beyond the reach of most of 
their admirers. It didn’t feel very good 


BILLY GETS BITTEN 277 

to their feet, that slimy mud, not at all 
clean and firm like the sandy river 
bottom. Nor did they like the swish 
of clinging water weeds on their legs. 

“I keep imagining I’m in a nest of 
snakes,” complained Billy, with a finicky 
dislike puckering his chubby face. 

“One thing against water lilies, they 
don’t choose very nice places to live in,” 
agreed Jap. 

“But the lilies themselves don’t get 
muddy or scummy, do they?” spoke up 
Tiny. 

“How can they be so white, growing 
out of mud and slimy water this way?” 

“’Cause their stems are so long, 
mebbe, they don’t get near the mud.” 

“My sister knows an awfully pretty 
poem about water lilies, about how they 
stay so nice and white and smell so 
sweet, for all they grow out of mud. 
And the poem says that’s the way with 


278 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


folks; they can be good if they want to 
in spite of the evil things around them. 
She’s learning it to speak at Sunday 
school next Sunday. Say, I’m going to 
take her some of these, then she can hold 
them while she speaks her piece.” 

“Let’s all take some home. My 
mother likes them.” 

“Mine, too, and my sisters.” 

“All girls and women like them, don’t 
they?” 

“Sure they do. Uncle Ben says, 
whenever girls see water lilies, they 
always start squealing about them!” 

“Ha-ha! They do, too.” 

“Mebbe it’s ’cause they can’t hardly 
ever get out where the lilies are.” 

“Won’t they be glad when we bring 
home these bouquets?” 

“Nice-smelling flowers, aren’t they? 
Don’t smell a bit like mud and slime.” 

“No, more like ’fumery.” 


BILLY GETS BITTEN 


279 


“Hi! Looky what a big bouquet I’m 
getting.” 

“Me, too. My sister’ll squeal when 
she sees this big bunch.” 

“I’m going to take some to my aunt. 
She’s awfully good to me. She brought 
me a little custard every day when I 
had the tonsilitis last winter. ‘Tasted 
awfully good, and I didn’t have to chew 
or swallow it — just open my mouth for 
it and then let it slip down.” 

“Say, custards are good. I could eat 
pecks of them.” 

“Grandmother makes fine custards 
I’ll take her some water lilies, too.” 

“My grandmother likes all kinds of 
flowers. I’ll take her some, too.” 

“Mine, too. She’s kind-a like a water 
lily, I guess, with her white hair and 
pleasant face and always sweet-smelling 
little ruffles around her neck and on her 
sleeves.” 


280 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Let’s give some to Mrs.'Munson, for 
the lunch.’’ 

“Say, let’s.” 

With big handfuls of the golden- 
hearted, white-fluted lilies, the boys 
waded out of the green, weedy water 
to shore, one after the other. Then they 
sat down on the grass, to braid the long, 
rubbery stems so they could carry their 
bouquets easier. 

All at once Billy gave a loud gasp. 
What he had thought was a black lump 
of mud on his leg, and tried to brush 
off with his toe, clung tight. He used 
his heel to push it away, and still it re¬ 
fused to budge, though it looked soft 
and his foot was still wettish. He did n’t 
want it to dry on, and, anyway, it had 
aroused his curiosity. It was such 
peculiar, rubberish mud, would move a 
little, even stretch a bit, when he 
touched it, but stay right there. 


BILLY GETS BITTEN 281 

He reached over, wonderingly, deter¬ 
mined to have it off. It did come off, 
after he took tight hold on it and pulled. 
Funny, but it was a bit like a worm, too, 
like a pulpy body. Then he noticed that 
it squirmed when he nipped it between 
thumb and finger. To his great horror, 
when he did get it off, blood began ooz¬ 
ing from his leg at the very spot where 
it had been. 

“Oh!” he yelled, springing to his feet. 

Then he cried out again, for on the 
side of one calf was another one of those 
blackish lumps, and by his ankle an¬ 
other! And there were several more on 
his other leg! 

“Help! Help! Something’s biting 
me! Help! They’re all over me, mak¬ 
ing me bleed!” 

He was half-crazed with fear, dismay, 
horror, stamping and jumping like an 
Indian dancing a sort of war dance, with 


282 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

wild whoops, motions, and everything 
complete except war bonnet and toma¬ 
hawk. His eyes were big with fright; 
they almost covered his round face like 
a couple of blue china saucers. 

“What is it? Skeeters?” 

“Can’t be snakes!” 

“Ants! He’s sitting on an ant hill, 
mebbe!” 

“That’s tough luck, in those clothes, 
Billy.” 

“Say, what’s the matter with you, 
anyway?” 

The boys had tossed aside their 
flowers to come to Billy’s help, but when 
they saw what was frightening him 
nearly out of his wits, they had to laugh 
at him. 

“Bloodsuckers! Nothing but blood¬ 
suckers!” 

“Bloodsuckers! All that fuss over 
just bloodsuckers!” 


BILLY GETS BITTEN 


283 


“Say, don’t you know bloodsuckers, 
Billy?” 

“Stop your dancing and yelling that 
way. Looky, we’ve all got ’em, too, and 
we aren’t acting like wild Injuns.” 

“Quit your yelling, Billy. They won’t 
hurt you — just draw blood out-a you 
till you pull them off, or they get full 
and drop off.” 

“Look at me. I’m covered with them. 
Don’t hurt a bit, either!” 

When their words, and the meaning 
of them, got through Billy’s head, he 
calmed down. When he saw how calmly 
the boys took their crop of the leeches, 
he discovered that he was far more 
frightened than hurt. Indeed, when they 
had settled down to the task of pulling 
the quiet, harmless little animals off 
their legs, Billy joined in the game, and 
found that there was no feeling at all 
when the blood oozed out. Soon he 


284 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

began to feel a strange sort of envy in¬ 
stead of fear, when he found that some 
of his pals could count their blood¬ 
suckers by the dozens, while his 
amounted to but half-dozens. 

“I never heard of bloodsuckers be¬ 
fore,” he admitted sheepishly, after a 
bit. “What kind of things are they, 
anyway?” 

“Kind of a worm, like an angleworm, 
only they suck blood from other animals 
for their living — food, 1 mean.” 

“Some folks call them leeches. 
Doctors use them sometimes to take 
blood out of folks when they have too 
much.” 

“Oh, I’ve heard of leeches. There’s 
some in Grochau’s drug store. The 
druggist keeps ’em in a jar of water, 
with some weeds.” 

“I know about them, too. Mr. 
Grochau told me lots of things. He says 


BILLY GETS BITTEN 


285 


you can tell if it’s going to be a nice day 
or not by watching them.” 

“Why, how do they know, and how 
can they tell?” 

“They can, though. If it’s going to 
be rainy they come up; if it’s going to 
be sunny they go down.” 

“But leeches are long and flat, not 
short and thick like these bloodsuckers.” 

“Oh, leeches are another kind of 
bloodsucker — tame ones, kind-a, for 
doctors to use.” 

“Say, they can stick to glass, even. 
One day, at the drug store, one leech 
was holding on to the jar by the tail, and 
another was holding on to him by the 
tail.” 

“Sometimes they’re fierce, though. 
Mr. Grochau says if you put one full 
of blood in with others, they’ll jump on 
him and start sucking the blood out-a 
him.” 


286 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Uncle Ben got his eye bumped and 
it was getting black, so a doctor put a 
leech on it and it sucked and sucked up 
all that blood and so he didn’t have a 
black eye — a very black one — after 
all.” 

“My father says bloodsuckers get on 
cow’s legs when they wade around in 
places where there are lots of weeds like 
this.” 

“My father found one once on a fish 
he was cleaning.” 

“Uncle Ben says fishes sometimes 
jump up out of the water to knock 
bloodsuckers off them.” 

“Say, I’m going to leave one blood¬ 
sucker on my leg, and see how long it’ll 
stay on — how big it gets.” 

“Me, too. I can stand it to lose all 
the blood one of them can suck out-a 
me.” 

“I am, too, then,” piped up Billy. 


BILLY GETS BITTEN 


287 


“Say, wasn’t I a ninny to get so scared 
about them?” 

“Oh, you didn’t act up like my sister 
did. Why, she fainted when she got 
one on her once, wading in weedy water. 
It scared her awful; she shivers yet 
whenever you say ‘bloodsucker’ to her.” 

“Made me feel kind-a shivery first 
time I ever got bloodsucked.” 

“Me, too. I saw the blood coming 
and thought right away I was hurt.” 

“So did I,” admitted Billy shyly, 
quite comforted to know he wasn’t the 
only person, or rather the only boy, who 
had ever been fraid-catty over blood¬ 
suckers. 


SKIPPER JAP AND THE 
“WATER-WITCH” 

“Say, if I’m going to get the wagon 
to soaking, it’s time I was at it,” re¬ 
membered Jap, as the Gang were wad¬ 
ing across the river to leave their water 
lilies with their other baggage. 

“Sure, now’s the time. Now we got 
these swimming togs on, we can slosh 
around all we like.” 

“The more we slosh the better it 
feels,” said Windy, splashing water over 
himself to relieve the sunburn beginning 
to trouble him where his wet, bare 
shoulders had been exposed to the sun. 

“Yes, till it dries. Then you’re burned 
worse’n ever.” 

“We’ll hafto take everything out of 
the wagon; then we can run her in where 
it’s good and deep.” 


288 


JAP AND THE “WATER-WITCH” 289 

“Yes, right up close to the dam.” 

“That’ll take all the rattles and 
squeaks out of her, sure.” 

“We can leave it in the water till 
we’re ready to get out for good.” 

Everything was accordingly unpacked 
— hay, robes, fishing tackle, pail, the 
black bag most carefully of all, except 
perhaps the lunch basket, which had to 
be opened and sampled before the work 
could go on. 

Billy, who felt rather more responsible 
for the bag than the others, hefted it 
when he and Windy had it stowed away 
under the tree with their other things, 
near where Old Dan took his ease in the 
shade until it should be time for him to 
get the expedition back to Mayville. 

“A fine, good, new-looking bag,” he 
pronounced it proudly. 

“Hope nobody claims it; then we’ll 
have it for our own.” 


19 


290 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“But if they do mebbe we’ll have a 
good re -ward out of it, for finding it 
and bringing it along with us, and keep¬ 
ing it safe and taking such good care 
of it.” 

“Even the good-for-nothing papers 
inside.” 

“Traveling man’s stuff, most likely.” 

“Best not to meddle, though, till we 
know just whose they are. We can 
always have a bonfire of them.” 

“Tell you, we can have it some night, 
in somebody’s back yard, if his folks 
don’t care, and have an Indian powwow 
around it.” 

“Let’s, with feathers in our hair.” 

“And tomahawks out of pasteboard.” 

When the wagon was completely 
emptied, Tiny and Windy laid hold of 
one shaft, Billy and Reddy of the other, 
while Jap, as “boss” of the outfit for 
the day, was in the middle, pulling at 


JAP AND THE “WATER-WITCH” 291 

the whiffletree by both ends. It took 
a little tugging to get the wagon steered 
around and started, but after that the 
wagon ran itself down the bank, carry¬ 
ing the boys along with it. 

“Hold back! She’s running away!” 

“Run, everybody! She’ll be nipping 
off our heels!” 

“No, don’t run! Hold her back!” 

“Hold her!” 

“She won’t hold back!” 

“We all need breechens, that’s the 
trouble!” 

Though they leaned back on their 
shafts with all their might, the wagon 
had weight enough and gathered speed 
enough before they could slow it down 
to carry the boys along at a stiff clip 
down the short roadway to the river, 
where others had been driving from time 
to time, probably for the same purpose. 
Into the water they splashed. Windy 


292 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

stubbed his toe and fell. Tiny stepped 
on him, the wagon wheel caught him, 
and for a moment there was great 
floundering and much excitement and a 
vast deal of noise. 

When Windy came up spluttering, he 
was unhurt except for a scratch on his 
nose and a cut lip and a skinned shin. 
He’d lost his bloodsucker, and so all 
chance of winning the contest as to who 
could grow the biggest one and the 
longest-staying one. He made more 
fuss over this calamity than over all his 
bodily injuries combined. 

“We should-a let the wagon go down 
backward,” decided Reddy. “Then we 
could-a pulled back on her better.” 

The deepest place they could find in 
the stream at this point, several rods 
below the milldam, didn’t reach the 
wagon box. Indeed, the river was so 
low thereabouts that, to give “her” a 


JAP AND THE “WATER-WITCH" 293 

good soaking, they swung the wagon 
about and ran it up toward the milldam, 
backward, until the box was about 
covered and the water was up to their 
own necks. There they parked the 
vehicle, with shafts hoisted in the air. 

“Now we can find it again,” laughed 
Tiny. 

They frolicked about for some time, 
near the wagon, around the milldam, 
or on either sandy bank. Finally, it 
was discovered that Tiny and Jap were 
the only ones still ornamented with 
bloodsuckers. Thereupon Tiny declared 
he was going to give his every chance. 
Of course, Jap wouldn’t be beaten if 
there was any way of winning the con¬ 
test, so both laid themselves down upon 
the sand, to await the time the feasters 
should have finished dining. 

“Mr. Grochau says that when a leech 
gets full of blood, and falls off, a doctor 


294 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

will sometimes pull it through his 
fingers, to strip all the blood out of it 
he can. Then he can use the leech again 
sooner. They won’t stick on anybody 
unless they’re hungry.” 

Soon the three who were out of the 
race lost interest in bloodsuckers; they 
started a new game, that of burying 
themselves by idly scooping handfuls of 
sand up over their feet and then gently 
squiggling their toes until the sand was 
all shaken away from around them. It 
proved such an attractive game that 
Tiny and Jap forgot their blooksuckers 
and joined in the sport. So it came 
about that both in time discovered their 
leeches had fallen off, or been brushed 
off, and who won the contest has been 
a mystery ever since. 

Next, Windy proposed that they 
wander upstream above the dam, on the 
far side of the river. This suggestion 


JAP AND THE “ WATER-WITCH ” 295 

was greeted with cheers, and all started 
off, across the river, up toward the big 
bridge. They kept to the land mainly, 
except when burning shoulders made 
them stop for a dip or to splash water 
over themselves as a cooling ointment, 
thereby adding moisture to the fire and 
so creating a steam that quickened the 
roasting process, as a cook bastes a 
turkey to make it tender. But that 
they didn’t realize to the full extent of 
the damage until the next day, when 
mothers and sisters were invited to 
“come on with the salve” in hopes of 
curing the soreness, or at least of stop¬ 
ping that painful “crackle” of blistered 
skin whenever they moved. 

In this manner they rambled and 
scampered along, until they found them¬ 
selves under the big bridge, from which 
folks coming from Mayville way caught 
their first glimpse of the mill, 


296 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Hurray, a boat!” Jap called out, his 
voice booming back from the bridge 
floor as though he had shouted into a 
great barrel. 

“Hurray, a boat!” the chorus boomed 
back, and the four followed Jap’s quick 
sprint along the bank to where an old 
rowboat lay, half in the water, half out 
of it. 

“Whoop-ee! Oars and everything!” 

“Say, let’s have a boat ride!” 

“Sure, if we can get her emptied!” 

With mighty tugs and a sturdy tussle 
with the water-logged old craft, the boys 
got it up on the bank and overturned. 

“Say, looky! Here’s her name — 
Water —” 

“Water-Witch!” 

“Let’s see if the old witch’ll float.” 

“Sure she will. She’s too water- 
soaked to leak any more till she dries 
out again!” 


JAP AND THE “WATER-WITCH” 297 

“Well, who’s going to do the rowing?’’ 

“1 can roar some. My father let me 
try one day, and I did it real well, he 
said,” offered Jap. 

“Well, if you can roar as good on the 
oars as you do on the lines, I ’ll risk you.” 

“Me, too.” 

“Pile in, everybody.” 

“But you want to remember the 
water’s deep up here, and sit still.” 

“Aw! I can swim in deep water, I 
can.” 

“Mebbe you can, Tiny, but I can’t. 
So don’t you go trying any monkey- 
shining.” 

“My father says never rock the boat 
when you’re in it, even if you can swim.” 

“All right, 1 won’t.” 

“All right. Push her off, Tiny.” 

So the “Water-Witch,” with Skipper 
Jap at the oars issuing commands most 
freely as to the actions, or rather the 


298 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

non-actions, of his passengers, got under 
way. Tiny was perched on the narrow 
seat, in the bow, Billy sat flat on the 
bottom at his feet, Skipper Jap had the 
middle seat between the oarlocks, Reddy 
and Windy were prim and quiet in the 
broad stern seat. 

With much tongue work, and a vast 
amount of lost, motion due to oars that 
went too deep or didn’t take hold deep 
enough or never even touched the water, 
to say nothing of the advice his crew 
offered in plenty, the skipper in time 
got his craft out into the current. There 
progress was easy, except as Jap’s awk¬ 
ward floundering with the oars splashed 
and sprayed the water rather than 
“feathered” it, and so rather delayed the 
action of the current with the “Water- 
Witch.” 

“Say, you’ll be banging a hole in the 
side of this old tub if you don’t watch 


JAP AND THE “WATER-WITCH” 299 


out what you’re doing,” cried Billy, as 
Jap swung an oar wildly around and 
dealt the “Water-Witch” a resounding 
blow. 

“Or my head,” warned Tiny, ducking 
the flying blade rather awkwardly but 
successfully. 

“Say, if any of you fellows can roar 
better than I can, just come try it,” Jap 
responded a bit peevishly, naturally 
somewhat nervous and excited. Besides, 
he was getting more advice than a 
skipper usually permits from crew or 
passengers. 

“No, don’t. My father says never 
change places in midstream.” 

“You’re doing fine!” 

“Sure you are. Just see how far we’ve 
come, and you’ve hardly roared a bit 
yet.” 

There followed a few quiet moments, 
except for the splashes and thwacks and 


300 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


wild above-water flourishes of the oars. 
Then, suddenly — crack! 

“What was that!” cried three voices 
in unison. 

“Say, remember I’m sitting behind 
you!” piped up Billy in a wild little 
squeak that ended in a loud alarm 
shout. “Say, you hit Tiny!” 

“Tiny’s overboard!” Tiny’s over¬ 
board!” bawled Windy. 

“You knocked him overboard!” 

“He’ll drownd sure this time, if you 
knocked him senseless.” 

“What’ll we do?” 

“Somebody get out and try to find 
him.” 

“Dive for him, somebody.” 

“Yes, but who?” 

“No, sit still — don’t tip the boat over 
or we surely can’t save him.” 

“Hurray! He’s all right!” shouted 
Reddy, peering around his side of the 


JAP AND THE “WATER-WITCH” 301 

boat. “He’s come up. He’s right along¬ 
side the boat!” 

“Here he is again, good as new!” 

“Hurray! Here he is.” 

Just then Tiny’s wet head peeped over 
the up-ended bow of the boat. 

“Who’s monkeyshining now, I’d like 
to know?” 

“ ’Scuse,” murmured Jap over his 
shoulder, taking a long breath at the 
sight of his buddy safe and sound and 
saucy as ever. 

“Well, I’m lots safer out-a the ‘Water 
Witch’ than in. I can swim, and Jap 
can’t row.” 

“I guess that’s right,” rejoined Jap, 
still apologetic. 

“Say, I’m going overboard, too!” 

“Me, too. I can hold on to the boat 
with one hand and be safe, if I can’t 
swim good.” 

“I’ll stick to the boat,” decided Billy. 


302 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


So soon Skipper Jap of the “Water- 
Witch” had but one passenger; the 
others were swimming about him, or 
alongside, like a school of young por¬ 
poises, taking care to keep out of the 
way of Jap’s oars. Finally, seeing how 
well these three did, even Billy decided 
to try it outside, with the boat for a 
floating buoy. 

This venture into deeper waters than 
they had heretofore tried, with the boat 
for company, proved such good sport 
that the boys didn’t notice that the hum 
of the mill and the roar of the milldam 
below them was growing louder and 
nearer all the time. When they did dis¬ 
cover it, they were only a few rods above 
the falls, out in the deep current and 
headed straight for the lowest part of 
the milldam, where the water flowed 
over in considerable volume. 

“It rows lots easier; mebbe I’m 


JAP AND THE “WATER-WITCH” 303 

beginning to learn,” Jap was congratu¬ 
lating himself when — 

“Stop her!” yelled Windy. “We’re 
going over the dam!” 

“Hold her! We’ll break the boat all 
to pieces if it goes over!” 

“Our necks, too!” 

“And mebbe the wagon down there. 
Hold her!” 

“I can’t hold her! Help! I can’t 
hold her!” 

“We’ll drownd in this deep water if 
we let go!” 

“And we’ll go over the dam if we 
don’t leggo!” 

“What’ll we do now?” 

Helpless and considerably frightened, 
the boys that were outside the boat 
clung to it like leeches. The skipper 
struggled valiantly with his oars, but his 
puny strength and awkward swings were 
powerless against the current, already 


304 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

gathering force with the pull from the 
falls. 

Wild-eyed they watched the crest of 
the dam draw nearer and nearer, while 
the sound of it seemed deafening to their 
alarmed senses. Each boy could already 
picture himself dashed to pieces on the 
apron below. 

“We’ll be busted to smithereens, boat 
and all!’’ shouted Windy, hoarse with 
fear. 

But what could they do? Nothing, 
except with horror-bulged eyes — and 
ears as well — watch that spillway draw 
nearer and nearer, listen to it grow 
louder and more threatening. 

Soon they were a boat length away, 
then half, then only a foot. Then, to 
their horror, the bow seemed about 
to shoot off into the air, preparatory to 
taking its wild death tumble. 

But, while every lad’s hair stood on 


JAP AND THE “WATER-WITCH” 305 

end, or felt that way, it so prickled in 
his scalp, and even blistered shoulders 
seemed breaking out in cold goose 
pimples of fear, Tiny, up nearest the 
bow on one side of the boat, gave a loud 
shout. 

“Hey! I’m touching bottom. Come 
on, fellows! We’re safe. Help! We 
can pull her around sidewise! Then she 
can’t go over!” 

For, though the boys hadn’t known 
it until that instant, a milldam is built 
like half of the roof of, a building, or 
like a lean-to, with the ridgepole for 
the crest of the dam, and rafters covered 
with planking running from it upstream 
but toward the bottom of the river, as 
the roof of a house slopes to the eaves. 
This is intended to keep ice and other 
floating material, also the current, from 
battering at the crest of the dam and 
from wearing the wall away between top 
20 


306 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

and bottom. Without this planking, 
any wall across a stream, even of heavy 
stones, would be broken down in a short 
time. 

With this roof-like boardwork to 
stand on, the boys easily pulled the 
“Water-Witch” around so the bottom 
of the stern end bunted up against the 
crest of the dam, after which it was an 
easy matter to tug it ashore. 

They didn’t try to row it back to 
where they had found it, but towed it 
along, canal-boat fashion, by the rope 
at its bow, while they themselves re¬ 
mained on the river bank. All the way 
they were hilariously twitting them¬ 
selves over the good scare they had had, 
punctuating their shouts occasionally 
with more serious thoughts of what 
might have happened to them if that 
planking hadn’t been there. 

“Well, it was, so we’re safe this time.” 


JAP AND THE “ WATER-WITCH ” 307 

“But I’m going to learn to roar a boat 
yet,” maintained Skipper Jap, who 
somehow felt that his cruise in the 
“Water-Witch” had not been wholly to 
his credit. 

“Well, better start on a ‘Sailor Boy’ 
or a ‘Jolly Rover,’ ’stead of a ‘Water- 
Witch,’ ” warned Reddy. 


REDDY TO THE RESCUE 


When the boys decided they had been 
in the water long enough, they also de¬ 
cided that the wagon was well soaked. 
They got it out of the depths where it 
had been parked and up in shallow 
water where a rather well-marked drive¬ 
way cut across from river edge to the 
road considerably higher up. 

“Say, it’s going to be a tug, getting 
her up this steep bank,” said Reddy 
when all stopped to rest a bit on the 
sand. 

“I know,” spoke up resourceful Tiny. 
“Let’s leave her here until we get ready 
to hitch up to go home, then Old Dan 
can pull her uphill.” 

“Good work,” applauded Windy, tap¬ 
ping Tiny’s head fondly. “Some think 
you thunk, that think!” 


308 


REDDY TO THE RESCUE 309 

“Thanks,” murmured Tiny. 

The boys lay about on the sand for 
a time, then rinsed the sand off their 
bodies and out of their trunks, and 
dressed. 

“Guess I’ll go see what time it is, and 
how Mr. Grannis is getting on with the 
grinding,” said Jap while he was button¬ 
ing his waist. 

They all trailed along to help him 
“see.” 

“Three-fifteen,” the miller told them. 
“It’ll be about an hour before I get to 
your grist.” 

They discussed what to do next, and 
decided to investigate the region of that 
small gully where the mill road crossed 
the little bridge just above the mill. 
Following the trickling stream up the 
gully, they came across another flowing 
well, even larger than the one by the 
mill, and loitered about there, on the 


310 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


oak-shaded bank, for some time. A cat¬ 
bird entertained them right royally, 
fluting and flirting away in the tree 
tops, now here, now there, now with one 
song, then another, with bluebird, robin, 
thrasher, and blackbird notes jumbled in 
with his own. 

Finally they were back to the little 
bridge, where they stopped for another 
idle moment, leaned on the railing in 
the sun, tit-tat-toe, five in a row, good- 
pal fashion. 

“Be a fine skating place, this mill 
pond,” remarked Jap. 

“The ice’d be thick and slick as glass, 
wouldn’t it?” 

“Let’s come some time next winter 
and try it.” 

“Sure; get an early start and spend all 
day here.” 

“Don’t have any was-sips for alarm 
clocks, though!” 


REDDY TO THE RESCUE 


311 


“No danger; they’d all be killed off 
by then, ’cept the queens that are going 
to live over till spring to start new 
families. But they’d be fast asleep for 
the winter, so no danger from them, 
either.” 

“How d’you know all that about 
was-sip queens?” 

“Read it, ’course. Don’t you ever 
read books and things?” 

“Sure I do, only I never read that.” 

“Well, mebbe you will some day; and 
if you don’t, you know it now.” 

“But let’s do come. I’ll ask Father 
for Old Dan again, and we could blanket 
him and he’d be all right.” 

“And bring some eggs to cook, and 
weenies, mebbe, and other such good 
stuff.” 

“Say, keep still! I hear something.” 

Reddy held up a warning hand, and 
put himself into a listening attitude, one 


312 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

ear cocked toward the river bank up 
beyond, his eyes popped as if to aid his 
hearing. Of course the other boys 
imitated him, but didn’t know just what 
sort of noise to listen for. 

“Not the mill exploding again?” 
whispered Windy. 

“Or somebody chewing thirty-five 
chokecherries?” Jap jibed him in re¬ 
turn. 

“Keep still, fellows!” 

“Just something splashing in the 
water up above,” Billy decided, and 
lost interest. 

It was a splashing noise, too, and 
seemed to come from a clump of alders, 
cat-tails, reeds, and such river plants 
that screened from their sight a little 
bend in the bank up beyond, about half¬ 
way to the big bridge. 

“Yes, but it’s something else. Listen, 
all of you!” insisted Reddy. 


REDDY TO THE RESCUE 313 

So they hushed again, all ears and 
eyes as he was. 

Soon came a most peculiar noise. It 
turned the boys rather chill, in spite of 
the fact that they were out in the full 
afternoon sunlight — that mixture of a 
groan and a moan, a cough and a 
wheeze, as of something in great pain, or 
fear, or despair. 

“Something’s in trouble up there,” 
decided Reddy. 

With the words, away he dashed, off 
the bridge, down the road, then through 
reeds and mud and bushes, forgetful of 
his bare legs and the scratches they 
would probably get. But when danger 
threatens any helpless or trapped crea¬ 
ture the rescuer rightly forgets his own 
comfort in an effort to be of service. 

And, of course, the faithful four were 
off behind him, as close as his running 
start would permit. 


314 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


It took them some little time to work 
their way along toward the splashing 
and the wheezing. And sometimes they 
lost it, as if whatever was making the 
sounds had become still and silent. 

“What could it be?” they wondered, 
to themselves and to one another, as 
they sped along. But this time no one 
could quote anything “Father” had 
read, or “Uncle Ben” had experienced, 
that would explain the strange sounds. 

Then, suddenly, Reddy, still in the 
lead, gave a loud yell. 

“Kids! Hurry, hurry! He’ll be 
drownded, sure!” 

And he disappeared among the 
bushes, still urging them to greater 
speed. 

“What can it be, d’you s’pose?” they 
puffed, sprinting their best gait. 

When they got to the place where 
Reddy had been when he discovered the 


REDDY TO THE RESCUE 315 

cause of the commotion, they saw a 
queer sight. 

A top-buggy was in the bayou up to 
the hubs. Between the shafts, or where 
they would be if they could be seen 
through the water that covered them, 
lay a horse, still hitched to the vehicle, 
but mired in the mucky water. Worse, 
he was down on his side, and it was only 
by turning his neck that he could lift 
his head out of water. Indeed, his nose 
was all that was to be seen of him, ex¬ 
cept as in his struggles he raised himself 
somewhat out of the water. Then, be¬ 
fore their horrified eyes, the old horse 
gave a sort of moaning snort and let his 
nose sink down below the safety line. 

Reddy was darting in and out of the 
reeds and brush, keeping to the edge of 
the bayou while still making his path 
as short as possible. 

And to their joy, as they splashed 


316 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


along in his wake, they saw the old horse 
lift his head again, proof that he was 
not quite gone yet. But his tired old 
neck was weak with the strain, and he 
was letting it settle below the water 
again just as Reddy reached him. 

With a yank at the bridle he lifted 
the old fellow’s head, and cradled it in 
his arms, wet and muddy though it was. 

“Hurry, hurry, fellows!” he panted. 

The boys came dashing to his help, 
commenting as they ran. 

“Must-a wandered off down the 
road.” 

“And come here to get a drink —” 

“And got mired down!” 

“And mebbe tangled up in his 
harness.” 

“Say, lucky Reddy heard him in 
time.” 

“How we going to get him loose, 
though?” 



“Hurry, hurry fellows!’’ Reddy panted 













318 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“Got to get him unhitched quick as 
we can, that’s sure.” 

“A little more and he’d-a been a dead 
horse, all right.” 

“Good work, Reddy, old scout, getting 
to the rescue that way!” 

“Hurry!” called Reddy. “He’s tired 
out and I have to hold the whole weight 
of him, seems like.” 

“Unhook the traces, quick!” 

The boys felt for the whiffletree, and, 
working under water, tried to unhook 
the traces. But the sag of the horse’s 
body against them drew them taut, and 
perhaps, too, his legs were across them. 
He was well tangled up, for the lines 
had been dragged under with him. 
Altogether, he was in a sorry plight — 
bound, mired, weary, drowning. 

“His old neck’s ’bout broken, he’s 
been trying to hold it out of the water 
so long,” condoled Reddy. 


REDDY TO THE RESCUE 319 

The old horse agreed, with a sort of 
snorting sigh, his big brown eyes on 
Reddy’s. 

“But what’ll we do now? We can’t 
unhook the traces, or untangle him, or 
get him up hitched to the buggy this 
way.” 

“Let’s pull him up.” 

But the old fellow couldn’t help him¬ 
self, so the boy’s couldn’t stir him, tug 
and push as they might. 

Then Reddy came to the rescue for 
the second time. 

“Cut the traces!” he commanded, as 
a captain might order his crew to “Man 
the boats!” in a last resort to save en¬ 
dangered passengers. 

The bold idea caused the boys to 
catch their breath with amazement, but 
they never faltered. Out came four jack- 
knives of various sizes, lengths, and 
degrees of sharpness, and all set to work 


320 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


sawing on the traces, as they could be 
found underwater. 

“Say, Jap, try to unhook the lines 
from his bridle,’’ called Reddy. 

Jap flew to obey, and tugged manfully 
at a tight buckle, his knife between his 
teeth to save the time of putting it back 
into his pocket. Billy quickly followed 
his example on the other rein, for, with 
his feet tangled in the lines, the old 
horse was pulling hard at his own head, 
and so making the weight on Reddy’s 
arms all the greater. 

“Whew! this leather’s tough,” puffed 
Tiny, for of course his dull and nicked 
knife blade, last used to open a tin can, 
could not be blamed for his lack of 
progress. 

“Say, we’ll never get these traces 
sawed through,” agreed Windy. “Seems 
like I been cutting hours now, and I’ve 
just nicked this one.” 


REDDY TO THE RESCUE 321 

“Cut ’em at the eye, then you’ll have 
only half as far to go,” was Jap’s idea. 

“Say, you and Billy run around and 
push the buggy up closer, then mebbe 
Windy and Tiny can unhook the traces,” 
directed Reddy. 

But the breech band and its straps 
wouldn’t permit the buggy to come any 
closer, no matter how hard the two 
pushed against it. So horse and helpers 
had to wait patiently until the four, 
taking turns with their different knives, 
could saw through the stout leather 
traces, at the top of the eye. 

By this combination of wit and force, 
the boys presently had the horse free 
from the buggy, and also from his en¬ 
tangling lines and other harness parts. 
Then, with encouraging pulls at the 
bridle, and shoves at his shoulders and 
flanks, they got the old fellow to his feet 
and up on dry land. 


21 


322 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


He was pretty shaky at first, but 
Reddy cheered him with pats and gentle 
words, while the other four rolled the 
buggy out into the meadow grass. They 
couldn’t hitch the horse to his wagon 
again, because of his trembling legs and 
cut tugs. 

“Say, whoever this rig belongs to will 
wonder who cut those traces, and why!” 

“And if they find out it was us, they’ll 
say it’s just like a boy, always up to 
mischief.” 

“I know: Write a note and tie it to 
the whip.” 

“Good idea. Who’s got a pencil, 
though, and where’s the paper?” 

“I’ve got a pencil,” and out came a 
stubby one that only a boy would think 
worth saving. 

In the buggy they found a package 
wrapped in paper, from which they 
took a piece large enough for a note to 


REDDY TO THE RESCUE 323 

explain what they had done, and why. 
Then they tied the horse to a tree, with 
a line long enough to permit his lying 
down in comfort, or grazing if he liked. 

“Guess he won’t need a drink right 
away,” they agreed, when all was done. 

“Well, seeing we saved his life, and 
got our clothes wet and muddy, his 
owner shouldn’t complain about the 
traces,” said Reddy. 

“That’s right, too.” 

And they started back to the mill, 
each one abeam over a good deed done, 
feeling amply rewarded in the certainty 
of having done it as well as the circum¬ 
stances permitted, content with having 
done it even if they never saw the owner 
whom their prompt action had benefited. 
The sight of the old horse, even though 
he was wet and muddy and weak and 
trembling, was a pleasant enough pic¬ 
ture to hang on the walls of memory. 


THEY FIND SOME FEARSOME 
FOOTPRINTS 


Back at the mill once more, the boys 
all had to have a drink to “wet their 
whistles,” as they put it, since they had 
done so much calling and shouting and 
talking in connection with rescuing the 
old horse that their throats were quite 
dry and stiff by the time they could visit 
the flowing well. 

Windy, the first one to reach the spot, 
burst into a grin that showed all his 
teeth. 

“Looky what 1 spy,” he said, point¬ 
ing into the drinking trough. 

Each of the four crowded up, prob¬ 
ably each with a different picture in his 
mind of what he’d find there. And 
probably not one of them imagined what 
he really did see — a big watermelon 


324 


SOME FEARSOME FOOTPRINTS 325 

floating like a water-logged old boat in 
the tank. 

“Say, whose do you s’pose—?” 

“How did it get —■?” 

“My! that’ll be a good one.’’ 

“It will that. Listen to her plunk!’’ 

“Say, no meddling!” 

“No plink about that melon, for a 
fact!” 

“No hurt to touch it.” 

“My, don’t you wish —?” 

“But ’taint!” 

’Twas, though, at least a big share of 
it, for just then they heard Mr. Grannis 
calling to them from the mill porch. 

“Bring it along, boys. I got it out of 
my garden awhile ago, and it ought to 
be cold by now.” 

“Watermelon on ice!” gasped the 
boys in delight. 

Be sure they brought it along, with 
great care, and also that on that cool, 


326 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

pleasant, singsongy mill porch they en¬ 
joyed the next half-hour, eating water¬ 
melon the very best way it can be eaten, 
in those big half-moons that literally 
make one’s mouth water from ear to ear. 

But, as all good things must come to 
an end in time, the big melon was 
finished, to the last shallow-dished end, 
the two pieces that left their proud 
winners, Tiny and Windy, wet from nose 
to chin. Gnawed down to the white, 
the rinds were still worth saving, in a 
pail, for the miller’s pigs, so he said. 

“Now, boys, I’m ready to grind your 
sack of wheat. Want to follow it over 
the mill with me?’’ 

Of course they did, though they felt 
so highly honored with the invitation 
to help grind their sack of wheat that 
they colored to the tips of their ears, 
just as though the miller had told them 
they didn’t dare step inside the place. 


SOME FEARSOME FOOTPRINTS 327 

First he brought his little two-wheeled 
handbarrow, or barrow-truck, as he 
called it, a kind of ladder ending in 
handles at the top of the two braced 
supports, and finished at the bottom 
with a little platform and a couple of 
wheels. He thrust the platform under 
the sack of wheat as it leaned up against 
the mill wall, pulled the top of the sack 
forward while bracing the truck with one 
foot, and, with the sack standing on the 
truck, trundled the wheat into the mill. 

He wheeled it over to a box with a 
funnel-shaped bottom which he called 
the "hopper.” With a deft forward 
move of the truck he stood the sack up 
against the hopper, leaned the truck 
against a shaft, untied the sack, looked 
at the wheat, nodded his head to indicate 
it was good grain, then, catching the 
sack in his strong arms, lifted it up and 
emptied it into the hopper. 


328 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“You know the fairy story of the 
wicked old witch the miller pushed into 
the hopper, I suppose?” he asked, as 
they stood watching the wheat swirl 
down through the bottom of the hopper, 
whirlpool fashion. 

“And she was never seen again,” 
nodded Windy. 

“It must-a spoilt the flour, that day, 
though,” remarked Jap. 

“No,” laughed the miller, “not really. 
People, I’m glad to say, are almost never 
as bad as the fairy stories make the bad 
ones out to be; and the miller couldn’t 
hurt the old witch much by pushing her 
into the hopper. See, if she could get 
through that small opening at the 
bottom, here’s what would become of 
her.” 

He pointed to a hole in the floor, 
where, at their feet, down in the cellar, 
the boys saw a sieve-like platform 


SOME FEARSOME FOOTPRINTS 329 

that kept shaking back and forth. On 
it danced a thin layer of the wheat that 
poured through the bottom of the 
hopper, and they saw that while the 
wheat dropped through the holes in the 
platform, the coarse seeds and little 
sticks and bits of straw and chaff stayed 
on the screen, to be pushed off at the 
bottom of the jiggling “table” into a 
pile of “screenings” on the floor of the 
cellar. 

“She’d be just chicken feed, you see,” 
laughed the miller. 

Well, they followed the course of the 
wheat all through the mill, down cellar, 
back to the ground floor, upstairs and 
down, through the millstones. Not that 
they themselves followed it there, of 
course, nor through any of the many 
different machines, but just saw it go 
in and come out again, through the rolls 
that worked like wringers, into the bolter 


330 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

that went round and round like the cradle 
on a binder but was covered with very 
fine silk cloth that sifted the flour, and 
finally back downstairs again, and round 
about, until the flour was trickling 
slowly down from a spout into the very 
sack, a clean one, Mrs. Munson had 
given them for the flour. 

The miller explained the workings of 
the many different machines, and even 
opened up a little trapdoor, or a slide, 
here and there, to let them peep into the 
thing. Often he stopped to sample a 
stream of flour by catching a bit of a 
trickling stream of it to rub between 
thumb and finger. He invited them to 
test the fineness of it as the flour left 
one machine on its way to another, 
which they did very solemnly, with 
great respect for the educated fingertips 
of the miller that could tell which flour 
out of which machine was the finest. 


SOME FEARSOME FOOTPRINTS 331 

Now, on the second floor, or the third 
counting the basement of the mill, there 
was a narrow open stairway that led to 
the platform about a great piece of 
machinery where the flour was bolted. 
The second time the miller went up 
there, he invited them to follow him, 
with the advice that they be careful not 
to touch any belts or wheels. One side 
of this overhead platform ran along just 
above a big bin that was half full of 
wheat. 

“Say, it’d be fun to jump down there,” 
spoke up Windy. 

“All right,” said the miller. “Play 
there all you like, just so you don’t 
touch any machinery anywhere up 
here.” 

Away he went, leaving them to romp 
and race through the deep wheat, or go 
sailing from the platform down into it. 
Tag was a favorite sport, as running in 


332 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

the wheat was much like floundering 
through deep snow. 

All at once Windy let out a startled 
“Oh!” that they all heard above the 
whirr of the mill and their own shouts. 
When they looked at him, his eyes were 
as big as gray stone mugs, or at least 
seemed that big. 

“Look!” 

He pointed to the side of the bin, the 
boarded-up side, with a finger that 
fairly shook with excitement. 

It shook with good reason, too; for, 
as if walking right up the side of the 
bin, were footprints — big, red ones, 
made by a human foot, a man’s foot, 
dipped in — could it be? — in blood! 
Yet so it appeared, for through the film 
of dust that glazed the boards the foot¬ 
prints glowed scarlet as could be — 
heels, soles, toes. And a row of them 
going right up the wall! 


SOME FEARSOME FOOTPRINTS 333 

The boys gasped, looking first at these 
fearsome tracks, then at one another. 
And into each mind flashed the memory 
of the wicked miller in the fairy story. 
Could it be—Mr. Grannis — had—? 
“Not an old witch, course, but —” 
Windy pointed downward. They 
caught his idea, and all looked the way 
he pointed, as if expecting to see spurts 
of blood, or even a human body, rise 
right up out of the wheat at their very 
feet. 

“Mebbe — some one — some one the 
miller — did n’t — like —” 

“Had a grudge against — mebbe—” 
“My father read about a man bury¬ 
ing— a woman — in his cellar—” 
“Uncle Ben knows a man that 
found —” 

“But he couldn’t walk up a wall!” 
“But it’s feet — a man’s feet — a big 
man’s feet!” they chattered, cold with 


334 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

fright, each one able to say but a few 
words at a time. 

“Say, what if he—Mr. Grannis — is 
an ogre!” 

“Like in Jack the-Giant-Killer.” 

“Do we dast dig down — in the 
wheat — and see?” 

“Sh — sh! I’m too scairt to—” 
“But sometimes — folks — boys, even 
— find things nobody else —” 

“Not even detec-a-tives—can find—” 
“Sure. Grandfather knows about a 
boy that found —” 

“So does Uncle Ben; the boy found 
a—” 

“Well, well!” boomed out a loud voice 
above them; and, when their frightened 
glances flew aloft to discover the miller 
on the platform there, every boy felt 
his hair rise just as Jack-the-Giant- 
Killer’s must have done when he heard 
the giant booming his “Fe-fi-fo-fum!” 


SOME FEARSOME FOOTPRINTS 335 

“You were so quiet I thought I’d lost 
you, or made you into flour — like the 
wicked miller in the fairy story.” 

And that only frightened them the 
more. He was looking for them, then, 
maybe to — 

The thought failed them, it was so 
horrible; for now the fear that had en¬ 
gulfed them was so great that a sort of 
brain paralysis had set in and they could 
only goggle wildly up at Mr. Grannis, 
then back to those bloody footprints. 

“Oh, ho!” laughed the miller, noticing 
just then where their eyes were directed 
when they weren’t looking up at him. 
“You’ve discovered those bloody foot¬ 
prints of mine! Ha-ha, I’ll have to tell 
you about them.” 

And down came the miller plump into 
the wheat bin, just as though he, too, 
were a boy. And, even in their fear, 
there was no mistaking now the amused 


336 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

expression he wore. There was some 
joke about it, then! Surely, from his 
look, there was a funny story tucked 
away in those footprints, not a tragical 
one! 

Windy, reassured more by the miller’s 
laugh than by his own reasoning or 
natural good sense, came back to his 
normal wits once more, out of the land 
of fairy lore and imagination into which 
he had.wandered for the moment, tak¬ 
ing the Gang with him. 

“What — what did — did make them, 
Mr. Grannis?” he asked. 

“You see, when 1 had this bin put in 
here, I bought the lumber from the 
dealer in Dow City, the one next to the 
tanyard there. Now the mixture used 
there in tanning leathers is red; hemlock 
bark, they use, and it’s a blood red, as 
you see. Some barefooted workman, and 
a big-footed splayfoot, too, judging by 


SOME FEARSOME FOOTPRINTS 337 

the prints of his feet, walked along that 
board, staining it red wherever he 
stepped, for a joke, probably, or maybe 
by accident. When the carpenter saw 
it, he added to the joke by nailing the 
board up in that way, so the footprints 
seem to be walking right up the side of 
the bin. Looks funny, doesn’t it?” 

“Yes,” grinned the Gang, sheepishly 
glancing at one another sidewise. 

For they had had a good example of 
that remark of the miller’s: “People, 
I’m glad to say, are almost never as bad 
as the fairy stories make the bad ones 
out to be.” 

Usualiy they aren’t as bad as our 
imaginations can make them out, either. 


22 


HOMEWARD BOUND 


What a wonderfully interesting day 
it had been, anyway, the Gang agreed, 
during the vastly exciting experience 
of getting Old Dan hitched up and 
everything packed — fishing tackle, 
lunch basket, hay, pail, blankets, and 
such paraphernalia as they had brought 
from home, to say nothing, or rather, a 
great deal, if the whole story of each 
were to be told over again, of the water 
lilies that filled Old Dan’s pail, and 
chiefly of the black leather bag. 

“Some bag,” they pronounced it once 
more, while hoisting it aboard and stor¬ 
ing it away under the seat. 

“That ought to be worth a good 
reward!” 

The miller helped load in the part 
sack of flour — to tell the truth he did 


338 


HOMEWARD BOUND 


339 


the work and they helped him — and 
the part sack of bran the wheat had also 
made. 

“Well, boys, had a fine day of it?” 

“Dandy!” 

“Thank you, sir!” 

“Well, come again some time. May¬ 
be the river and the mill can offer you 
some further adventures.” 

“We sure will.” 

“Good. Be glad to see you — all 
three of us will. Good-by!” 

“Good-by!” 

And off they started, Jap at the lines, 
Windy and Tiny on the seat with him, 
Billy and Reddy in the very back of the 
spring wagon, on the hay, dandling their 
legs out over the end gate. 

Mr. Grannis stood watching them 
from the mill porch, arms akimbo, his 
flour-dusted overalls and shirt, and 
straw hat turned up in the back, giving 


340 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


him a particularly softened, gentle, 
good-hearted, boyish look. 

“Guess I’ll be a miller when I grow 
up,” murmured Billy. 

“Me, too. Let’s be pardners and have 
this very mill,” replied Reddy in the 
same happy mood. 

“Let’s, and when Windy and Tiny 
and Jap send their boys to mill with 
wheat, we’ll let them look all around 
inside, too.” 

“Good-by:” they called, as Old Dan 
started on a little jog trot down the hill 
that would take them out of sight of 
the mill for a time. 

“Good-by! And come again!” waved 
the miller. 

Over the little bridge at the foot of 
the hill they trundled, and past the 
bayou where they had rescued the old 
horse from his watery grave. 

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342 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

to the old fellow, still tied to his tree 
and grazing as peacefully as though he 
had not been very near to death not 
many half-hours before. 

“Good-by and thanks!” he nickered, 
to which Old Dan replied with an under¬ 
standing word or so of greeting, con¬ 
gratulation, and farewell. 

Then the Old Scout went back to his 
grazing, and the last they saw of him 
was the switch of his stubby gray tail, 
fighting flies. But they knew he would 
be well looked after, for they had told 
the miller all about him, and had 
Mr. Grannis’ promise that if the old 
horse was still there after supper he 
would care for him until his owners 
came searching for him. 

The turn that hid the Old Scout from 
sight took them from the mill road into 
the kitty-cornered road that would carry 
them across the big river bridge, and 


HOMEWARD BOUND 


343 


so on for over a mile, where they would 
be back on the Black-and-White Trail 
and headed straight for Mayville. 
Crossing the big bridge, with its clatter¬ 
ing iron framework above, was still a 
sort of adventure, which they enjoyed 
to the full. 

“Good-by, old Water-Witch!” they 
greeted the rowboat that had given them 
a short ride and a shorter fright, and 
which they had left drawn on the bank 
in better shape than they had found it, 
since it was now emptied of water and 
ready for whoever wanted to use it 
again. 

“She’s still riding the waves,” nodded 
Jap, her ex-skipper, rather proudly, feel¬ 
ing a sort of responsibility for her well¬ 
being though his command of her had 
been brief and stormy. 

“Hurray, there’s the miller! Good- 
by, Mr. Grannis!” cried Windy, as he 


344 


THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


pointed donwstream to the mill, alight 
in the western sun. 

Mr. Grannis was leaning out of a 
window that commanded a good view 
of the mill pond and of the big bridge, 
and when he took off his hat to wave to 
them in return the golden sunlight 
brightening that whole side of the mill 
set his shock of curly white hair 
gleaming. 

“Hurray! Good-by!” they waved 
and called, and then, inspired by Tiny, 
they set up a song of farewell that was 
wholly hearty if not altogether musical: 

Good-by, Miller! 

Good-by, Miller! 

Good-by, Miller! 

We’re going to leave you now! 

Everybody cheered and waved, in¬ 
cluding Mr. Grannis, until Old Dan 
clop-clopped off the bridge and trees 
hid mill and miller from sight. 


HOMEWARD BOUND 345 

“Say, what do you guess he’ll miss 
us. Bet it’ll seem lonesome without us,” 
remarked Tiny. 

“I guess yes!” agreed they all. 

Along the wooded, kitty-cornered 
road they rolled toward home, as fast 
as Old Dan’s now remarkably spry old 
legs wanted to carry them. He, too, 
seemed to think the journey homeward 
quite an adventure; at least, he set off 
as though he expected to find something 
interesting in the trip. Perhaps at the 
very end of the journey? 

“Hurray, the Black and White- 
Trail!” they hailed the highroad, with 
a flourish of five battered pieces of head- 
gear, at the first glimpse of its zigzag- 
marked telephone poles on ahead, a 
white Z on a black band. 

This point safely made, Tiny sug¬ 
gested that it was time to eat. And 
right here it might as well be confessed 


346 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

that that was the very last time the 
lunch basket was opened that day, be¬ 
cause when they shut it up again it was 
quite empty, even of crumbs, the few 
that remained in it after the last cooky 
and sandwich and piece of cake were 
taken out, being scattered in the road 
for the birds. 

“Here’s your Dow City signboard,” 
greeted this landmark when they 
reached it. 

“And there’s Farmer Bingham’s 
road,” piped up Windy, indicating the 
crossroad that they passed over at this 
point. 

“My, but we’ll know this road good 
by the time we get through working for 
Mr. Bingham next week!” gloated Jap, 
who expected to drive the crowd back 
and forth, with Old Dan’s help, and his 
father’s consent, both of which might 
safely be taken for granted, his father 


HOMEWARD BOUND 


347 


and Old Dan being listed among Jap’s 
best pals. 

“Say, remember that auto that went 
whizzing along here just as we got to 
that hill on Farmer Bingham’s road?” 

“And the one that looked like Sheriff 
Meining’s, this morning?” 

“Here’s where Billy jumped out to 
read that ‘Free Camping Grounds for 
Tourists’ sign, too. See his feetprints 
in the dust?” 

“Sure I can.” 

Billy knew Reddy and Windy didn’t 
see them, because he peeped over and 
didn’t see them himself; the road had 
been too well traveled since then. But 
he beamed just the same. 

In fact, they all glowed with jollity 
and good cheer. What fun it all was, 
anyway, this going back over the road, 
and these joyous cries of “Here’s where,” 
and “Remember how,” and the pleasant 


348 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


memories it brought back! Indeed, they 
found that the road was well dotted with 
recollections for them, places not marked 
on the route book tourists would follow, 
but unforgetably inscribed on the charts 
of their boyish minds. 

“Here’s where that first auto passed 
us!” 

“No, it’s farther on.” 

“ ’Tis, too, the place. Here’s the 
culvert they hit going past us.” 

“No, this is a different one. We’ve 
got to go farther.” 

“It’s this one. I know, ’cause after 
that I kept a close lookout and we went 
over three more before we turned at the 
Dow City sign. This is the fourth one 
from that crossroad, so it’s the one.” 

“Hi, then! Let’s look for the can of 
bait.” 

“Naw! Who cares for bait now?” 

“But the fishhooks in it!” 


HOMEWARD BOUND 349 

“Who cares for fishhooks? We’ve 

caught our fish.” 

“I want mine. They cost me a 
quarter, and then I had to catch my fish 
without one.” 

This argument caused Jap to rein Old 
Dan to a stop, much as the old fellow 
hated to have his homeward jaunt inter¬ 
rupted. He gaped over it considerably, 
and pretended not to hear their loud 
“Whoas!” or to feel the bit against his 
jaws as they all pulled on the lines, but 
finally he was prevailed on to jolt into 
a dead stop. 

Billy and Reddy got out to search 
the ditch, but Tiny and Windy remained 
in the wagon to help hold Old Dan, un¬ 
easy and restless over the delay, and 
much inclined to bring it to a close. 

“Whoa!” 

“Hurry up. Old Dan wants to get on 
home.” 


350 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Come on, he won’t wait much 
longer.” 

“Leave ’em go and come get into the 
wagon.” 

They did wait longer, though, till 
Reddy found the can in the dry, weedy 
ditch where it had bounced, and came 
running up with it. Everyone applauded 
the successful search, especially Old 
Dan, who expressed his delight by break¬ 
ing into a good trot before the two had 
more than caught the rear of the wagon 
box with elbows and stomachs. 

The fishhooks were safe; and, to finish 
up their story right now, they are put 
carefully away among their owners’ 
choice possessions, ready for the next 
time the Gang goes to mill. The worms 
were also fresh and undamaged, but are 
not put carefully away for future use. 
The boys mourned over the waste as 
Reddy let them dribble out of the can 


HOMEWARD BOUND 351 

into the road, but doubtless the birds 
that happened upon them the next 
morning thanked their lucky stars that 
it had rained dewworms along that 
stretch of road. 

"Here’s where we met up with the 
ghost!” they giggled from time to time, 
whenever they thought that spot should 
be just about reached. It never was 
decided just when they passed the 
identical place where that wisp of moon¬ 
lit fog had so deceived their boyish 
senses for a time. It was on a little 
bridge, but there were several along the 
way, and, as no one had taken pains 
to count them off, as Windy had the 
culverts, they couldn’t agree on the 
exact spot. 

But one “Here’s where” was not to 
be so overlooked, for the strong taint in 
the air still lingered to mark the hill 
where they had so narrowly missed a 


352 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

most unpleasant encounter with the 
wood pussy. 

“Wow!” they agreed to a man, as 
Old Dan slowed down to climb the hill. 

“I s’pose everyone that went along 
here today said something about a skunk 
being around in the night,” tittered Tiny. 

“But we’re the only ones that really 
know just when it was!” 

“And we don’t know just when, only 
that it was awfully early this morning.” 

“Or awfully late last night.” 

And, of course, they must hail every 
sign with cheers: “Mayville 5 Mi.”; 
“Mayville 4 Mi. Stop At Brown’s”; 
“Mayville 3)4 Mi. Save The Pieces” 
(which they jeered noisily); “Mayville 
3 Mi.,” then 2. At last it was just 
growing dusk; they rounded a hilltop 
and there lay “Mayville 1 Mi.” on ahead, 
the street lights twinkling them a 
friendly greeting from beyond the fields. 


HOMEWARD BOUND 


353 


"Almost in, now!” 

"Wonder if the folks have missed us 
today!” 

“An early start!” 

“And a late getting-home!” 

"Hurray — some day!” 

"Sure has been.” 

“My, makes me feel a hundred years 
old, going along this way and thinking 
of all the things we’ve seen and done 
today!” 

"Seems like a hundred years since 
we saw Mayville last, for a fact!” 

“Two hundred!” 

"A thousand!” 

"A million! Say, any gray hairs in 
my head?” 

“No, they’re all red yet, Reddy.” 

"I s’pose this is the way we’ll feel 
when we’re old men — things’ll keep re¬ 
minding us of things that happened, like 
they do Grandfather.” 

23 


354 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

Which wise Windy remark is very 
true. Life is considerably like a day’s 
journey; old age is like a going back 
along the way, with the thoughts more 
on what has happened than on what is 

king place now or is to come. 

If only, when the Gang are white- 
haired men, all their memories may be 
as good and happy, as merry and joyous, 
as bright and loving, as these of their 
day at the mill! Then they may truly 
call themselves successful. For only a 
man in whose memories no evil and ill 
will have place, but just good deeds well 
done and innocent, harmless pleasures 
shared and enjoyed, is, in God’s sight, 
a successful man. 


BUDDIES ALL IN THE 
BIG REWARD 

“Whoo-whoo!” 

“ Hip-hip-hurray!” 

“Hello, Father! We’re back!” 

“Hello, Mr. Munson! Here we are!” 

“Hurray! The Gang’s all here!” 

“Well, well, here they are, Mother!” 
Mr. Munson greeted the five as they 
came clop-clopping and cheering through 
the alley in the dusky twilight, and drew 
up in the side yard. 

Out they leaped from the spring 
wagon, for what they had thought would 
be the end of their wonderfully exciting 
day, except for the pleasant memories 
it would always have for them. But 
no, there was still more. 

“Supper!” called Mrs. Munson from 
the kitchen door. “Supper, everybody. 


355 


356 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

Hot biscuit and honey, boys! Wash up, 
quick, and come right in!” 

“Run along, boys. I’ll look after Old 
Dan,” Mr. Munson told them. “Leave 
things in the wagon till after supper; 
they’ll wait and the biscuit won’t.” 

“Come on, kids,” Jap urged the hesi¬ 
tating four, and led the way to the wash¬ 
room, the willing quartette at once close 
at his heels. 

Tiny was the first to finish washing, 
and disappeared. But in a minute, 
while the others were still toweling their 
wet faces, he was back, with a handful 
of water lilies, shyly offering them to 
Mrs. Munson. 

“Water lilies! Why, bless your heart, 
Tiny Long, how did you know I love 
them?” 

“I guess ’cause all women and girls 
do,” he grinned, blushing with pleasure 
to see her hurry to get them into a green 


BUDDIES ALL IN THE BIG REWARD 357 

earthenware bowl on the supper table, 
right in the center, for ornament. 

Then, around the table, aglow under 
the electric chandelier and loaded with 
good things, the boys had that great de¬ 
light second only to enjoying an ex¬ 
perience originally, and that is telling 
all about it. 

And it didn’t interfere with their en¬ 
joyment of the biscuit and honey and 
other “eats,” because one could tell a 
few lines while the other four refreshed 
the inner boy. With Mr. and Mrs. 
Munson’s interest in the day’s doings 
to keep them going, they had a long 
story to tell. 

“Say, Father, do you remember any 
big sign about the tourist’s camping 
grounds at Dow City?” 

“No, don’t believe I ever saw one.” 

“Neither did I. It must be a new one, 
on the Black and White—” 


358 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Where the Mayville seven miles sign 
is, you know.” 

“Oh, on the Clarion crossroad, eh?” 

“Well, that made me think we’d come 
too far, so I turned off there. We went 
and went till we were sure we were lost, 
so we stopped near a farmyard, and 
had some lunch, and—” 

“And the farmer found us — 
Mr. Bingham — and invited us in to 
breakfast —” 

“And he’s got a lot of berries coming 
ripe next week, and we’ve got the job 
picking them, if — if —” 

“If you’ll let me have Old Dan to 
drive us back and forth?” 

“We’d pay you for the use of him, 
Mr. Munson, of course.” 

“Just take good care of him; that’s 
all I ask, Reddy,” Mr. Munson re¬ 
plied. “The old fellow might as well be 
jogging along the roads as lolling around 


BUDDIES ALL IN THE BIG REWARD 359 

in a pasture or stall, provided he isn’t 
overdriven, or left too long without 
water, and is taken care of in such 
ways.” 

“Hurray for Mr. Munson!” 

“Hip-hip-hip-hurray!” 

“And hurray for Old Dan!” 

“And Mrs. Munson and the lunch!” 

“And the biscuit and honey!” 

“Hip-hip-hip-hurray! Hip-hurray! 
Hurray!” 

“Thank you, boys. Glad you enjoyed 
it. Anyway, just see what I got out of 
it, too,” and she pointed to the bowl of 
lilies. 

“Oh, yes, An auto went past us 
awful fast, Mr. Munson—” 

“And Old Dan started to run, and 
everybody nearly got ditched —” 

“And we lost our can of bait, and our 
extra hooks in it!” 

“And Reddy caught a bullhead with- 


360 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

out a hook — just tied a big clam on the 
end of his line, when he lost the only 
hook he had —” 

“And when the bullhead nabbed it he 
was caught for sure!” 

“So we had fried fish for dinner, any¬ 
way.” 

“But the car nearly got ditched, too, 
it was going so fast.” 

“What kind of car was it?” Mr. Mun¬ 
son seemed more interested than ever, 
but in a different way — without the 
smile in his kind eyes, with a very wide¬ 
awake look there instead. 

“Oh, we don’t know what kind, nor 
anything about the other one that went 
roaring along the Black-and-White 
afterward —” 

“Only Old Dan didn’t run that time, 
’cause that was after we turned off it 
and got lost, and ended up at the 
farmer’s finally.” 


BUDDIES ALL IN THE BIG REWARD 361 

“Then there were two cars?” 

“Yes, going awful fast, lickety-split, 
like they were racing across the whole 
United States.” 

“Jasper! You don’t suppose these 
infants—” 

“There, Mother, of course not. At 
least, no need to worry about it now, 
since they’re home safe. 

“0 Mrs. Munson, the fellows in the 
car, the first one, 1 mean, came lots 
nearer tipping over than we did!” 

“You see, they hit the ditch and then 
came bouncing up over the end of the 
culvert, and just missed going over. 
They yelled something at us, and went 
on lickety-split.” 

“But they lost out a big black bag. 
Billy found it.” 

“It must-a jounced out when they 
hit —” 

“What’s that?” 


362 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


The five stared at Mr. Munson’s sharp 
question, but he went right on asking 
more in the same excited fashion. 

“A big black bag? You say Billy 
found it in the road? Where is it?” 

“In the buggy,” chimed the quintette. 

“With the flour, and bran, and basket, 
and trunks, and other things,” added 
Windy. 

Mrs. Munson stared at her husband, 
and he stared at her. Then the ques¬ 
tions began again. 

“But how did you find it? How did 
you come by it?” 

“Why, when Billy ran back to look 
for our can of bait that jounced out, 
he found it in the road.” 

“We didn’t hurt it, honestly, 
Mr. Munson.” 

“Honestly, Father, we’ve taken good 
care of it all day, and haven’t touched 
a thing in it.” 


BUDDIES ALL IN THE BIG REWARD 363 

"Only peeked in to see what was in 
it, after we got it up in the wagon. 

"It wasn’t locked, you see.” 

“We could see in ’cause the moon was 
bright as day.” 

“Moon! You mean to say you were 
seven miles from Mayville by moon¬ 
light?” 

So they had to tell all about their 
early start, which brought them back 
to the bag. 

"Nothing in it but papers, though.” 

“At least, that’s all we saw when we 
peeked in that one time. We haven’t 
looked in since, being so busy; and any¬ 
way, they’re just folded up, like travel¬ 
ing man’s papers.” 

"Papers, you say?” Mr. Munson 
sprang to his feet. "Well, we’ll just 
have that bag in here and get a look 
inside. No, I’ll get it; you finish those 
biscuits while they’re hot. You see. 


364 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


boys, you’re not the only Mayvillians 
that have been having some excitement 
today, beginning in the night. We’ve 
all been more or less excited and upset 
— we stay-at-homes.” 

“What’s that?” 

The boys stared at each other, while 
Mr. Munson went hurrying out. “That 
old horse!” they wirelessed each other. 

“Was it a runaway, then? Was any¬ 
one hurt?” Windy asked for them all. 

“No, not a runaway, exactly; more 
of a get-away, you might say,” she re¬ 
plied. “And no one was hurt, and they 
were caught. But to think that you 
boys were alone! It frightens me to 
think of it.” 

“Oh, we weren’t in any danger; we 
were out of the boat by then.” 

“Even out of the river, and dressed. 
Reddy heard the old horse, down in the 
bayou above the mill —” 


BUDDIES ALL IN THE BIG REWARD 365 

“The old horse! The bayou!” 

“You remember, Mother, the one be¬ 
tween the big bridge and the little one, 
before you get to the mill?” 

“And we got there just in time to save 
his life.” 

“Yes, and honestly, Mrs. Munson, we 
had to cut the traces to get him loose.” 

“He’d-a drownded if we hadn’t-a 
done it. Mother.” 

“So we wrote a note to explain that, 
and the miller said he’d tell the folks 
that own the rig all about it when they 
come to claim the old horse and buggy.” 

“You see, he was trying to get a drink, 
and got down and all tangled up in his 
lines and harness, and couldn’t get out 
— and —” 

“And couldn’t keep his head out of 
the water, so we had to cut the traces 
to get him up.” 

Mrs. Munson was listening with much 


366 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

interest to this new happening, but with 
a puzzled look on her face, too. 

“But what does that have to do with 
the bag?” 

“Why, nothing. We found the bag 
before we got to the mill.” 

“Before daylight, even.” 

“While the old horse drownding was 
this afternoon. But—” 

In hurried Mr. Munson, with the 
familiar black leather bag that had been 
with the boys since that moonlight 
moment of the early morning when Billy 
had come waddling down the road with 
it in his arms — with them, but often 
out of their minds altogether, so unim¬ 
portant did they consider it as compared 
with other more exciting affairs of the 
day. Having accepted it as a chance 
find, and intending to use it in common 
for packing their belongings in whenever 
they went awandering with Old Dan and 


BUDDIES ALL IN THE BIG REWARD 367 

the spring wagon, unless some one 
should claim it, of course — to them it 
was already a bit of Gang property. 

“Unlocked, you say?” 

“Yes, sir.” 

“We looked in, ’cause we thought if 
any one ever claimed it we’d need to 
know what was inside to make ’em 
identify it right.” 

Mr. Munson set the bag on the table, 
under the light. The boys, certain of 
what he would find, yet interested anew 
because Mr. Munson seemed to be so 
concerned over it, watched him from 
over big bites of biscuit and honey. 

Mr. Munson took one look inside, 
then nodded to his wife. 

“It’s it, all right.” 

Then to the wondering-eyed five: 
“You say Billy found this bag, boys?” 

“Jasper! Just think of it! These 
children — alone!” 


368 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

“Yes, sir, in the road—” 

“When he ran back to look for —” 

“It’d jounced out, you see, when they 
hit —” 

“Then, Mr. William Turner Ballou, 
the Mayville State Bank has five hun¬ 
dred dollars for you whenever you find 
it convenient to call for the reward!” 

“Reward!” 

“Five — hundred!” 

It was their eyes as much as their 
voices that uttered the astonished ex¬ 
clamations. 

“Just take a good look at these papers 
by electric light, boys.” 

Mr. Munson held up a package of 
them, and then they saw they were not 
just ordinary forms, or traveling man’s 
stuff. They were crispy, and much 
stamped in gay colors. 

“But it isn’t money!” 

“Liberty Bonds.” 


BUDDIES ALL IN THE BIG REWARD 369 

"Liberty Bonds! Why, where—” 

“Yes, Liberty Bonds, over fifty thou¬ 
sand dollars worth of them, belonging 
to citizens of Mayville. Some to your 
own fathers.” 

“But how?” 

“This way,” explained Mr. Munson. 
“Those two men robbed the Mayville 
State Bank early this morning. Prob¬ 
ably just about the time you were start¬ 
ing out of Mayville they were sneaking 
into the bank. They were making their 
get-away in an auto, but lost this bag 
of bonds when they passed you. The 
sheriff was hot on their trail, and his 
was no doubt the second speeding auto 
you saw on the Black-and-White Trail 
last night, or rather early this morning.” 

“Say, it’s sure lucky we got an early 
start.” 

“Then it was Sheriff Meining’s car we 
saw this morning!” 


24 


370 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 


“How’s that?” 

“A car was going along the Black- 
and-White this morning toward May- 
ville when we were getting back into the 
trail from Farmer Bingham’s road.” 

“Tiny said then he thought it was 
Sheriff Meining’s car.” 

“Raced the robbers, but missed the 
sheriff both ways!” gasped Mrs. Munson 
weakly. 

“No doubt Tiny was right, because 
the sheriff and his posse caught the men 
the other side of Dow City. They had 
the currency in one bag, which the 
sheriff got all right. But this one — 
they told about losing it somewhere on 
the road, but the officers didn’t know 
whether to believe them or not. They 
were inclined to think the men had 
hidden it, though why they hadn’t 
hidden the money, too, Sheriff Meining 
couldn’t explain. Anyway, the bank 


BUDDIES ALL IN THE BIG REWARD 371 

offered the reward, and it’s yours, Billy. 
Also the bag.” 

"Mine! No-sir-ee! Not just mine!” 
cried Billy, white with excitement except 
blue eyes that were big and dark and 
shining as large jet buttons. “You see, 
Mr. Munson, 1 only happened on it, 
looking for the can of bait. We’re all 
buddies in the reward, and it’s got to 
be divided among us, even, in five 
parts.” 

And so it happened that, in addition 
to having a day chockful of interesting 
experiences to remember, each one of 
the Gang now has one hundred dollars 
deposited to his credit in the Mayville 
State Bank, earning interest for him 
until he is ready to use it all in going to 
college, or in starting a business, or any¬ 
thing else equally important for a young 
man'. The Gang also possesses a fine 
black leather traveling bag to take along 


372 THE GANG GOES TO MILL 

on all its outings, whether to carry 
swimming trunks, turtles, pearls, water 
lilies, carnelians, or whatever else they 
choose to put into it. 

And did they pick berries for young 
Farmer Bingham as they had agreed? 
Certainly, for what boy of honor ever 
goes back on a promise? 































































